It’s time to not drive at night if your vision can’t accommodate.
It’s a sad realization when you have to limit yourself to only day driving.
I had to do it.
It’s better to decide for yourself, rather than let someone else force it upon you.
The world does not owe you accommodation.
Either way, the OP is talking about walking.
Dark Ass Bourgeoisie will be the title of my Concept Album/Tour/Documentary project.
I drive down unlit streets all the time. I live way out beyond the streetlights. I often find it more challenging to try to drive on lit city streets, because there’s so much traffic coming at me that my eyes can’t adjust to the brief dark spots between headlights.
Glaring lights near or on the road can be challenging. Bad weather can cut visibility and be challenging. An unlit road at night in good weather? When I can’t do that I’ll have to stop driving at night. Or get my (currently only incipient) cataracts fixed.
My neighborhood was built between 1959 and 1972 or so. It has sidewalks and the houses are close to the street but it gets super dark. Maybe ten years ago all of the street lights went out. It was crazy dark when there wasn’t a moon at night. It took them several months to figure out how to fix them, to allocate funds and then to do the fix. The lights themselves were updated from halogen (?) to LED which is a big improvement.
It’s good to know that there are people out there who are opposed to street lights. What else do you object to? Penicillin? Running water?
I hope this is not… uses google… oh, shit.
We are doomed as a species. Dooooooomed.
Tee-hee. 
(Heard that before, like every freakin’ day since I discovered Crocs.)
I googled it too and they better be the pink ones. They’re super cute.
Neon green
I have a couple of friends who stay in those areas. Fortunately, two in particular are courteous. They added solar lights along the pathway from the parking spots on the top of the hill down to their front porch. There are also a few small lights by the by the parking spaces. It’s just spooky when I leave their property though. There are NO streetlights on their street. A narrow and windy street.
I have gone to people’s houses for work, many of those people were not as courteous as my friends. It was hard to find their addresses, no light near the driveway, and sometimes not any light on their porches.
Sometimes I pass through these areas to get from one destination to another. A few nights ago, I left the casino to grab some dinner and I had to pass through a dark bougie neighborhood to get there. I almost hit two deer, eventhough I was driving with my high beams. It was just so damn dark. Had the area been more lit I would’ve spotted the deer much earlier.
Yes, I carry a flashlight. I mentioned that in my OP. Smith & Wesson M&P/Duty Series/CS 1,000 lumen flashlight. Cell phones lights aren’t sufficient in brown recluse and copperhead territory. Both of those bastards come out to hunt at night. I need to see them before they see me. And they’re very bad for spotting addresses. Not only you need a bright beam, but you also need more concentrated light beam. I can just aim around the porch or garage to find the Addy. No need to light up the whole place and disrupt the neighbors, like yall said it’s good to avoid light pollution (sometimes).
Darkness for stargazing?
You have go way outside city limits to get in some spectacular stargazing. Like two hours. Yeah, you might see the Big Dipper in your dimly lit suburb, but if you want to see the Milky Way you gotta be around 120 or more miles away from a major city.
You dim your carlights as to not blind the deer.
Avoid twilight and dawn.
I said this is SES-related because it appears to be a high SES urge. Neighborhoods within cities and the suburbs tend to be well artificially lit. But somehow when you get to the higher income areas it’s lights out. It’s intentional.
Dude, why you gotta hate? Us proles should stick together!
CRUISING unknown neighborhoods at night? I wish my life was that exciting. 
I don’t cruise.
Dinsdale and pulykamell, how about some of those old money communities up in Lake county?
I dunno, man. Not my stomping grounds. But on the infrequent occasions I’ve been somewhere in Wilmette, Winnetka, Glencoe… I’ve been able to make it to where I was going and find the front door w/o hitting deer or running into - what? Brown recluses and copperheads? In northern IL?
I’ve got no idea how the folk N of the burbs I mentioned light their homes. But, yeah, I would expect it could be dark.
I doubt many people drive through Kenilworth or Lake Forest on their way from a casino to a restaurant. What business do you do with what sort of person that you come to their homes at night and they fail to even turn on a porch light? Just seems quite outside of my experience.
So, you’re on your dark estate… enjoying a meteor shower or a comet mentioned in the news. Suddenly some guy walks up un-announced and points his gun at you / your house with the flashlight on…? In my state, that’s called “Brandishing” and is a felony by itself.
< Jail Time > < Jail Time >
Do the people whose houses you are visiting know that you are armed? Do you have their permission beforehand to set foot on their private property with a gun? This sounds way too much like a ‘hit’ or a home invasion or a really stupid NBA/NFL rookie or someone with dubious intent driving slowly around a neighborhood at night with a gun. Do fireworks ensue…?
If they do, do they get their next Little Caesar’s Pizza half off?
< Discount > < Discount >
Also, carrying guns in casinos? I know that in NJ there was a court case about it, but the casino owners still say, “This is private property and We get to decide”.
< Scarfo > < Scarfo >
Noted! Still, since you deemed this worthy of a Pit, I’m not understanding the problem as it relates to you. I could see an Amazon delivery after dark, and that means the person receiving their “out for delivery” notice should turn on an outside light. It would be inconsiderate not to do so. Even so, your GPS will say “arrived” when you are literally in front of the residence in question.
I’m not interrogating you, I’m just trying to get an understanding of the situation.
I could see that. Like Lake Forest or something? I don’t usually (well, pretty much ever) go to residential neighborhoods up there, so I wouldn’t really have a good idea of what they look like at night. If I’m up thataways, it’s either driving through or visiting something on a main road. Winnetka is about as far north as I generally end up visiting people.
I agree you have to be pretty well away from the city to see the Milky Way, or at least what I consider really “seeing” the Milky Way. I’ve only really seen it in the aforementioned Tasmania, in a remote part of Croatia on the Bosnian border, and I think I’ve seen it on the Rubicon Trail. Even with our dozens of trips to Wisconsin Dells or Door County or Chippewa Falls, nothing that truly captures the Milky Way like those places. If you look up a light pollution map, you can see just how much of everything east of the Mississippi is just covered in it.
I don’t agree with the OP, though. Had I a nice property in the far North Shore suburbs, you bet I’d be keeping the lights low. Not to discourage any ne’er-do-wells, but because I like it. Plus I’m the dad going around the house constantly flicking off unnecessary lights. 