Hawthorne, CA Outdoor Lighting: Light Trespass & Shielding (2026)

100 sets special security provisions for commercial buildings within Hawthorne's building security requirements chapter. Subsection J covers lighting, address identification, and parking areas, and makes compliance mandatory for existing structures within one year of the chapter's 1988 adoption, not just new construction. Item 4 requires any open parking lot, and its access, that serves more than ten spaces and the general public to maintain a minimum of one foot-candle of light on the parking surface from dusk until the close of business every operating day, and it requires that lighting be 'engineered so as not to produce direct glare or "stray light" on adjacent properties,' the chapter's light-trespass standard.

The same subsection separately requires illuminated address numbers at least six inches tall on every commercial building, visible from the street during darkness, and exterior commercial doors lit with a minimum of one foot-candle during darkness, using weather- and vandalism-resistant fixtures. 110 for active construction sites: perimeter lighting installed at least every 150 feet and at least 15 feet high, at a minimum 2,000-lumen output, protected by a vandalism-resistant cover, and again 'engineered so as not to produce direct glare or "stray light" on adjacent properties' from dusk to dawn.

Both standards apply on top of, not in place of, any outdoor lighting requirements imposed through the zoning or site-plan review process for the same property.