Bristol Township, PA Home Business: Signage Rules (2026)

Bristol Township treats a home business as accessory use G1, Accessory Home Occupation, under § 205-16, and the sign limit sits inside its general standards. The premises cannot differ from their residential character through colors, materials, construction, lighting, show windows, signs or advertising visible outside the premises to attract customers or clients, other than a sign as permitted in Article XXIX of the zoning chapter. The same list of standards requires the occupation to be carried on wholly indoors, caps floor area at 25% of the ground floor area of the principal residential structure, bars exterior storage of materials or refuse, and requires a building permit for all accessory home occupations.

Article XXIX supplies the sign numbers. Section 205-155 defines a residential sign as a sign in a district zoned for residential uses that contains no commercial message except advertising for goods or services legally offered on the premises. In the R-1, R-2, R-3, R-4 and EH Districts, § 205-163 allows each lot one residential sign of no more than two square feet, freestanding or on the wall, either nonilluminated or indirectly illuminated. Each lot also gets temporary signs of up to six square feet, no more than four in a calendar year and two at a time, removed after 30 days. Separately, § 205-162 allows without a permit an identification sign displaying only the name or address of the occupant, one per property or family, up to 200 square inches, and an incidental sign of up to two square feet.

Section 205-16 points to Article XXIX for the permitted sign and does not print a separate sign size for home occupations. Under § 205-169, a building permit is required before erecting any sign greater than two square feet in area, unless the code exempts it. Under § 205-159, signs cannot sit in the ultimate right-of-way of a street, must be set back at least two feet from a sidewalk when two square feet or less, and must be no closer than 15 feet to a side or rear lot line.