A private pilot flying a C172 landing at a large airport at night; was asked to exit the runway at t...

Narrative:

Landing at night at a large airport. Was planning to exit at echo and planned touch down accordingly. After landing was instructed to exit the runway at echo and contact ground. Everything at this point was as planned and prepared for; the problem was that I could not see echo exit. I informed the controller about this fact and that I had missed the exit. She answered that that I had not and was right by where I was. I could see the echo sign; but not the actual taxi way. I therefore turned the aircraft 90 degrees to shine my landing light onto the side of the runway. The controller thought that I was turning the aircraft 180 which I was not.at the end I was not able to see exit echo and followed the controller's instructions down to delta that I found easily due to the green lights marking the exit. This was a very frustrating experience since I had reviewed the ground chart and knew where I was going. Even though I've been at large airports before; the lights at this airport looked like a forest without ability to understand patterns. I contribute this to the seating position in the cessna; I was simply not high enough to make sense of the markings. My suggestion for improvement is to get better markings for echo and that the exit be tested from a low seating position aircraft.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A private pilot flying a C172 landing at a large airport at night; was asked to exit the runway at taxiway E; but was unable to identify it; although Tower advised he was 'at' E. The reporter cited the lights looking like 'a forest;' and his 'low seating position' in the light aircraft as contributing factors.

Narrative: Landing at night at a large airport. Was planning to exit at Echo and planned touch down accordingly. After landing was instructed to exit the runway at Echo and contact ground. Everything at this point was as planned and prepared for; the problem was that I could not see Echo exit. I informed the controller about this fact and that I had missed the exit. She answered that that I had not and was right by where I was. I could see the Echo sign; but not the actual taxi way. I therefore turned the aircraft 90 degrees to shine my landing light onto the side of the runway. The controller thought that I was turning the aircraft 180 which I was not.At the end I was not able to see exit Echo and followed the controller's instructions down to Delta that I found easily due to the green lights marking the exit. This was a very frustrating experience since I had reviewed the ground chart and knew where I was going. Even though I've been at large airports before; the lights at this airport looked like a forest without ability to understand patterns. I contribute this to the seating position in the Cessna; I was simply not high enough to make sense of the markings. My suggestion for improvement is to get better markings for Echo and that the exit be tested from a low seating position aircraft.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	1231681
Time
Date	201501
Local Time Of Day	0001-0600
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Night
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Skyhawk 172/Cutlass 172
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Taxi
Flight Plan	VFR
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 5.2 Flight Crew Total 259 Flight Crew Type 116
Events
Anomaly	No Specific Anomaly Occurred All Types