Albemarle County, VA Outdoor Lighting: Dark Sky Rules (2026)

1 spells out the ordinance's purpose in three parts: to protect dark skies, to protect the general welfare by controlling spillover of light onto adjacent properties, and to protect public safety by preventing glare from outdoor luminaires. 2 sets the applicability trigger: the rules cover any outdoor luminaire installed or replaced after adoption that either sits on commercial or industrial property (or a site requiring a site plan under Sec. 32) and emits 3,000 or more maximum lumens, or sits on residential or Rural Areas property not requiring a site plan and uses a high-intensity discharge lamp of any lumen output.

4(a) then requires each covered luminaire to be a full cutoff fixture, meaning it directs light downward rather than outward or upward into the sky. The section spells out lumen thresholds by lamp type for older technology, for example a 160-watt incandescent or quartz halogen lamp, a 45-watt high-pressure sodium lamp, or a 25-watt low-pressure sodium lamp, and requires LED fixtures rated at 3,000 total lumens or more to be full cutoff as well. Property owners who want relief from the full cutoff standard, such as for athletic-field lighting that cannot meet the standard and still light the field safely, may ask the Board of Supervisors for a modification or waiver under Sec.

5, but only after providing five days' written notice to abutting property owners and only if the Board finds the standard would not serve the ordinance's purposes to an equivalent degree.