Observing at Tampines Eco Green

[Gary]

Hi Friends. Came to know about this park from Fizzy recently. He has since done a recce of the area. You can see some of his photos here:
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set= ... .739160733

This may be an interesting spot to stargaze. I may do some recce on my own and update this thread accordingly.

This sentence from the following article should trigger a "whoa" response from you :

"The park is not lit at night to minimise disturbance to the sensitive wildlife at the park."
Source: http://www.nparks.gov.sg/cms/index.php? ... &Itemid=50

For those who are interested to check out the place, please take note there will be mosquitoes there. If the place is very dark at night, there may be a safety issue also. So try not to observe or recce the place at night alone.

Don't feed the monkeys and don't let them steal your valuable eyepieces in the dark.

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Tampines Eco Green official webpage from Nparks:
http://www.nparks.gov.sg/cms/index.php? ... &Itemid=75

Location: Tampines Eco Green, Tampines Avenue 9 and Tampines Avenue 12

Park Size: 36.5 ha

Getting There

- Bus Take Bus no. 293 from Tampines Bus Interchange and alight at bus stop near to Tampines North Primary School along Tampines Ave 9. Walk 15 mins to the park.

- Take bus no. 8 15 18 19 27 28 29 37 38 81 168 291 293 and alight at bus stop opposite to Tampines Regional Library. Walk 10 mins to the park via Sun Plaza Park.

- MRT Alight at Tampines MRT station and walk 20 mins to the park via Sun Plaza Park.

- Car Visitors can park at the nearby Tampines Housing Estate Block 408, 409, 412,413 and 414

[cloud_cover]

Erm, you'll have to hand carry your scope from the busstop/carpark.......

[Gary]

Erm, you'll have to hand carry your scope from the busstop/carpark.......

Hahaha. Bro, no "pain" no gain lar.

In a perfect world, we can see Milky Way skies in Singapore every night at the comfort of our open rooftop homes (i.e. no time wasted clearing customs ) and without any source of artificial light shining in our way while observing through our scopes.

So I guess, this "pain" is a small price to pay for possibility of being able to fully dark adapt our eyes in Singapore and have a big open dome of unblocked sky above our heads. Very low possibility of being chased away by the police due to potential complains from nearby residents.

This "pain" can also be much relieved if you can find at least one person to go along with you. Drive your car near the entrance, unload your stuff on a trolley, let your buddy look after the stuff while you drive to the nearest carpark and park your car. During the Saturn watch event at Toa Payoh Central, that was how we managed to unload James's C14 and Maguro's 8" reflector. They temporarily "park" their car near the taxi stand to unload their stuff before driving to the very nearby carpark.

Alternatively, if you do end up going there to observe alone, why not just try to enjoy grab-and-go visual astronomy for a change? IIRC, you still have some nice light weight portable refractors. Just pair it up with a portable AZ mount and you are set for a potentially rewarding experience of forgetting that you are observing in Singapore while still in Singapore.

If the public response to this Eco garden concept is good, Nparks will definitely consider building more of them here. I think building brand new parks with no or very minimal artificial lighting is definitely good news to local stargazers. We should be encouraging Nparks to build more perhaps by actively supporting their upcoming big festival event in September where this Tampines Eco Green will be officially launched among other events.

This is definitely easier than persuading Nparks to remove, shift or switch off existing lightings or stop adding new lightings in current parks (just happened to my favourite dark spot in Toa Payoh Park) for stargazing purposes.

[shirox]

looks promising. Cloud its so near to your house haha dun complain la. whahahaha

[Enterprise]

Is there a path in, maybe we can still push trolley into the "clearing"?

[fizzy123]

Hi folks, I think it would be better for me to explain the ground in person here on the forum so as to clarify things abit.

Firstly, the park is located between ave9 and ave12 of tampines with the TPE flanking it to the north. The park no doubt being small by standards, I think might be a conducive location for observation due to the relatively dark ambient and the ease of access to the park. This park despite being labelled as an eco-park, should not be interpreted as those nature reserves like Bkt Timah or Sungei Buloh. This park is well paved with carpet grass that are well trimmed and wide enough to accomodate 3 persons walking abreasted to each other. This is unlike the nature reserves with rocky muddy paths that a uneven, this place is more civilised. It is also significantly darker than other urban sites as the park as to the left of the park is the tampines mountain bike trail, which is itself limiting in terms of light pollution due to its forested nature. To the right is some HDB flats, but these flats are at least a street away and together with the sporadic mrt activities, the light pollution is quite restricted.

If you look at the map i have provided in the FB, the ideal spot for observation will be grounds in between the first pond and the next to the north. The space is large enough to park at least 3-4 scopes in a line. In all, this site might be meaningful for small observation groups with smaller number of scopes and since the park is gazetted as a nature protection zone, one could be assured that Nparks is not going to install lights within the park so as to prevent disturbing the nocturnal animals. There is neither gates nor any official opening hours for the park, until the tampines mountain bike trail, thus it will be accessible for all through out the night.