Carroll County, GA Outdoor Lighting: Dark Sky Rules (2026)

Carroll County adopted its Corridor Development Plan (CDP) Ordinance, codified at Section 102-16, to protect land along mapped primary and secondary transportation corridors shown on the County Corridor Overlay District Map, effective October 4, 2005. Appendix A to that ordinance, Article III, sets the lighting and utilities standards that apply inside those corridors. 1(A) requires streetlights at intersections along public rights-of-way, whenever new streets or intersection improvements occur, to use fixtures deemed dark sky friendly by the manufacturer, subject to county engineer review and approval.

5 footcandles of illumination measured five feet inside an adjacent property line. 1(D) and (E) require all other lighting to be shielded so the lamp is not visible from beyond five feet inside a neighboring lot, and prohibit any light cone wider than 120 degrees total or more than 60 degrees from vertical. 5(D) exempts home occupations, single-family building permits outside a larger development plan, and agricultural production from the CDP entirely, so an ordinary house or farm outside the mapped corridors is not reached by this standard.

Because the CDP and Chapter 102 both govern unincorporated territory only, this dark-sky rule has no effect inside Carrollton, Villa Rica, Temple, Bowdon, Whitesburg, Mount Zion, or Roopville.