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Urban building owners and observant residents have long known that some mornings find numbers of dead birds scattered around the sidewalk around lighted tall buildings, and shorter buildings adjacent to a large lake or ocean that birds might migrate over at night.  Although more research is needed, we do know that turning out the lights significantly reduces this mortality

“Birds migrating at night are strongly attracted to, or at least trapped by, sources of artificial light, particularly during periods of inclement weather. Approaching the lights of lighthouses, floodlit obstacles, communication towers, or tall lighted buildings, they become vulnerable to collisions with the structures themselves. If collision is avoided, birds are still at risk of death or injury. Once inside a beam of light, birds are reluctant to fly out of the lighted area into the dark, and often continue to flap around in the beam of light until they drop to the ground with exhaustion. A secondary threat resulting from their aggregation at lighted structures is their increased vulnerability to predation. The difficulty of finding food once trapped in an urban environment may present an additional threat.” (www.flap.org)

White Paper explaining Lights Out program

Annotated Bibliography of research articles compiled by American Bird Conservancy

Map of U.S. cities with Lights Out programs