Amarillo, TX Outdoor Lighting: Billboard Lighting (2026)

Section 4-2-14 governs legally nonconforming off-premise signs, meaning billboards that were lawful when built but no longer meet the current code because the rules changed or the city annexed the area. Subsection (A) allows routine maintenance: replacing nuts and bolts, repainting, releveling the structure, swapping the message face for one of the same size or smaller, and replacing up to half the poles in any twelve-month period. Subsection (B) draws a hard line against anything beyond that maintenance list, calling it an 'upgrade,' and its very first named example is lighting: 'Adding lights to an non-illuminated Nonconforming off-premise Sign or adding more intense lighting to an illuminated Nonconforming off-premise Sign, whether or not the lights are attached to the sign structure' is listed as prohibited, alongside enlarging the sign face, adding poles, changing materials, or converting the sign to electronic message center technology.

An owner who performs a lighting upgrade must remove the sign immediately or bring the entire structure into compliance with the Zoning Ordinance within thirty calendar days of the violation. The rule effectively freezes a legally nonconforming billboard's lighting at whatever level existed when the sign lost conforming status, so a billboard that was unlit stays unlit and one that was dimly lit cannot be switched to a brighter fixture or an internally illuminated face without triggering full code compliance, including the current sign-standard brightness and residential-buffer limits in Section 4-2-9.