To the Editor:

We moved to the area known as Princeton Ridge about a year ago. After many trips up from the city of Baltimore while house searching, Princeton Ridge stood out to us because of its beautiful natural wooded environment, the dark skies for ideal stargazing, and the ability to have some land. It had the natural elements that we were longing for while living in Baltimore — the opposite of city life. In Baltimore you would look to the sky and see maybe three stars … if you were lucky. Good for some, but for the long term we wanted something different.

Since we moved to Princeton Ridge we have grown to love it. We have enjoyed seeing beautiful racked piebald deer on our property. We have enjoyed many evenings around the fire pit in our yard, looking to the stars and feeling like we were camping somewhere beautiful. We have come to believe that Princeton has it all — beautiful natural places like this, and a wonderful hustling bustling town for those who prefer to be closer to it all. 

We were recently informed that our neighbor (the Princeton Academy of the Sacred Heart) would like to point no less than five extremely high lumen lights directly at our property from Monday to Thursday until 9:30 p.m. as part of a plan to build one of Princeton’s largest outdoor lit sports complexes (11 light towers overall). This would destroy the natural environment on the Princeton Ridge.

In the Princeton Master Plan, published on the Municipal website, the Planning Board references all that we hold dear; community character, quality of life, scenic aesthetic quality, preservation and protection of the natural environment. The Planning Board is committed to evaluate all regional planning, ensuring that it conforms to their core values, “that all permitted development is designed so as to be as harmonious as possible with the surrounding neighborhood.”

I hope that the Planning Board will seriously consider the extreme nature of the proposed light pollution on the surrounding Princeton Ridge Community and deny this application.

Darryl Jones
Great Road