Why communities are now lighted so badly is a complicated question. I've avoided blaming the car, but the evolution of the automobile -- whose needs, as you're all aware, kind of overwhelmed the traditional walking city -- has had something to do with it.
The car just demands
so much, and erodes environments so much, that it has drawn away and spread
thin resources that could otherwise build and maintain some real quality
cities. Regarding city lighting, in a few short years, during the 1930s,
street light practice went from being seriously artful and urbane
to heavy-duty scientific and utilitarian, primarily in service
of cars. Today we need, or think we need, so much light for the car that
we can only afford cheap light, for instance. We need it delivered on such
a scale that light doesn't directly relate to human beings at all.