Wausau, WI Outdoor Lighting: Dark Sky Rules (2026)

20(5)(d) is Wausau's core dark-sky rule for exterior lighting. It requires outdoor lighting to use full cut-off fixtures that face downward, with the express instruction that no direct light may transmit onto adjacent properties. Two narrow exemptions apply: decorative fixtures with frosted glass lamps, and any fixture using a bulb rated at 1,700 lumens or less, which the ordinance equates to a 100-watt incandescent bulb or its compact fluorescent equivalent, along with lighting for intensive outdoor recreation uses such as lit ballfields. Beyond the fixture type, the code fixes where a fixture can sit and how tall it can be.

Light fixtures cannot be located within a required bufferyard or a required minimum setback, keeping the light source itself away from property lines. Maximum mounting height then scales with zoning district: eight feet in the SR-2, SR-3, SR-5, SR-7, DR-8, and TF-10 single- and two-family districts, twelve feet in the MH-7, TRD-12, MRL-12, MRM-20, MRH-50, and NMU multi-family and mixed-use districts, twenty feet in institutional and several commercial and office districts, and thirty feet in the LI, MI, and HI industrial districts. Fixtures that were already in place before the 2020 effective date of the current zoning title keep legal nonconforming status rather than having to be retrofitted. 42, so a new commercial or multi-family project has to show its fixture cut-off type and mounting heights before a permit issues.