This would be great! I wonder how many lights would have to be turned off and how large of a surrounding area would need to dimmed to get a good look?

While it's a fun idea, the purpose of those lights is to provide a safer place to live. I doubt a lot of places would get behind this idea for that reason.

Hyenuf, what about if the police or something like that blocks off traffic in that area?

I agree. When I was younger, they used to turn all the streetlights off at 1 am. I think they assumed no sensible citizen would be out after that time, so leaving them on was just wasting electricity.

You would also have to turn of all lights in shops (shop windows, shop names), plus all advertising signs, building floodlights, and all those annoying lights people put in their porches which turn on as you walk past, setting their dog off barking. This would need a law change, not just turning off the public lighting.

It is remarkable how much you can see, if all lights are turned off.

You might be able to designate all new development around a county park as a "Conservation of Light" zone. And then have your StarLight events in the Count Park.

I grew up in a neighborhood adjacent to a State Park. There were no street lights in the neighborhood. Yet the local highway provided a bit of light pollution. Light pollution can be caused from lights many miles away.

As a means for a community to conserve energy, it's interesting. But any existing developments probably won't give up their lights because the kids are used to them. For areas with high crime rates, it might be a cause for more crime.

When the cost of energy gets high enough, I guarantee you that every night will be star night.