It\u2019s why Shannon helped spearhead the Dark Sky Corridor, a project that aims to connect six dark sky sites across 180 kilometres of the Fundy coast. Once complete, it will be the highest concentration of dark sky sites in the world.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778944510_857_default.jpg\")
The proposed dark sky corridor would extend from New River Beach Provincial Park to Hopewell Rocks Provincial Park, taking in the vast Municipality of Fundy-St. Martins, outlined on the map. (Google Earth)<\/p>\n
Since announcing the project last summer, a committee has been working on a legal framework to enshrine that protection, especially against future development. <\/p>\n
A light pollution bylaw is just one item on seven pages of requirements municipalities must fulfill to achieve accreditation from DarkSky International, the organization that certifies dark sky locations on a global scale.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are going for the hardest [accreditation] to achieve,\u201d Shannon said.<\/p>\n
The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada is the body that traditionally certifies dark sky sites in Canada. It\u2019s approaching 30 sites across the country, including four in New Brunswick: three dark sky preserves in Mount Carleton Provincial Park, Fundy National Park and Kouchibouguac National Park, and an urban star park at the Irving Nature Park in Saint John.<\/p>\n
The society\u2019s accreditation process is not as extensive as DarkSky International\u2019s \u2014 Fundy-St. Martins’s final application to DarkSky could run up to 120 pages. Fortunately, Shannon said, there are footsteps to follow. DarkSky International has accredited just one other municipality in Canada: the Town of Bon Accord in Alberta.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778944510_957_default.jpg\")
St. Martins and District Chamber of Commerce president Elaine Shannon said the new village council will receive a presentation for a light pollution bylaw in July. (Emily Brass\/CBC)<\/p>\n
The person in charge of Bon Accord project 10 years ago heard about the Fundy-St. Martins corridor on the news and sent Shannon a message on LinkedIn saying, \u201cI\u2019d really like to help you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe literally handed us his package that [the Town of Bon Accord] presented to DarkSky International, which included their bylaws,\u201d Shannon said.<\/p>\n
A lot changes in 10 years, though. Shannon, who\u2019s also the president of the St. Martins and District Chamber of Commerce, said the organization used Bon Accord\u2019s bylaw as a guide to make something \u201cpalatable\u201d for the village.<\/p>\n
The chamber presented a bylaw draft to Fundy-St. Martins council in February, but with the May 11 municipal election looming, Shannon said councillors weren\u2019t comfortable starting a process that couldn\u2019t be finished before the swearing-in of a new council.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778944511_85_default.jpg\")
The Bortle scale measures the quality of light in a specific area. (Submitted by St\u00e9phane Picard)<\/p>\n
The chamber will present the bylaw to the new council in July, and Shannon hopes it will be enacted within a year. <\/p>\n
The bylaw, though, is just the tip of the iceberg. Fundy-St. Martins will also have to provide DarkSky International with a light policy plan, a leisure plan, scientific data and then, post-accreditation, annual reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s like eating an elephant. We’re taking it one bite at a time,\u201d said St\u00e9phane Picard, an astrophotographer and astrotourism consultant involved in the project.<\/p>\n
This month, Picard is travelling to different sites around Fundy-St. Martins to gather light pollution measurements for the application. Using a sky quality meter, he\u2019s recording where the village falls on the Bortle scale, which ranks the brightness of an area from one to nine.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Fundy-St. Martins falls between a two and a three, Picard said, well above cities like Toronto that come in at nine. But prime darkness can be found throughout New Brunswick \u2014 it\u2019s mostly forested \u2014 and Picard isn\u2019t stopping with the Fundy coast.\u00a0<\/p>\n
WATCH | Bylaw, annual reports, tourism strategies all needed for corridor project:![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778944511_922_default.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Fundy-St. Martins must pass light pollution bylaw for astrotourism project<\/p>\n
The St. Martins and District Chamber of Commerce will present a draft bylaw to protect the darkness to the Fundy-St. Martins village council in July.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s helping Neqotkuk First Nation get an accreditation, and he said Miramichi and Neguac have urban star parks in the works.<\/p>\n
It would be easier to get certifications from the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, but Picard said that extra seal of approval from DarkSky International will not only super power an astrotourism industry in New Brunswick but also act as a conduit to the rest of the world\u2019s star-lovers.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce we get the accreditation, that’s like planting the fire, and people will pay attention to that,\u201d he said. \u201cThey’ll know that it gives legitimacy to the dark skies of the community.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778944512_63_default.jpg\")
Astrophotographer and tourism consultant St\u00e9phane Picard is measuring light quality at different sites around Fundy-St. Martins as the community prepares its application for a DarkSky International accreditation. (Emily Brass\/CBC)<\/p>\n
Communities can lose their accreditation if they fall below DarkSky\u2019s standards, so the application is a long-term commitment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Shannon hopes that commitment will last seven generations and beyond, especially for her newborn grandson. She dreams he will one day walk the beach by her house, breathe in the same earthy smell of the mudflats, hear birds swooping through darkness as they travel ancient migratory routes, look up and see the Milky Way swirling in the sky as he plays in her backyard below.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re this tiny planet, right? Hurling through space. It humbles you; it brings you back to the point of the whole thing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Elaine Shannon waits for darkness to walk the ocean floor. From her home in Fundy-St Martins, a village…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":673658,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,66],"class_list":["post-673657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=673657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673657\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/673658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=673657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=673657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=673657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}