Taylor, TX Outdoor Lighting: Light Trespass & Shielding (2026)

Chapter 7 of the 2024 Land Development Code defines LIGHT TRESPASS to mean light emitted from fixtures designed or installed in a manner that unreasonably causes light to fall on a property other than the one where the light is installed, in a motor vehicle drivers' eyes, or upwards toward the sky. 5, the section that phases nonconforming outdoor lighting into compliance. Commercial property with lighting that predates the Code's adoption gets ten years from the adoption date, or from an annexation date if the property joined the city later, to bring its fixtures into conformance, and a purchaser who buys within that ten-year window may request a further three-year extension.

But that grace period has a hard limit built in: nothing in that subsection may be construed to allow light trespass or any other form of nuisance from outdoor lighting. In other words, a business cannot point to the ten-year (or thirteen-year) compliance runway as cover for a fixture that is actively spilling light onto a neighbor's property, into a driver's eyes, or up into the sky in the meantime. 5(2), but a structure that sits vacant for six continuous months is deemed abandoned, forfeiting nonconforming status and requiring any previously nonconforming lighting to be removed. The Code was adopted by Ordinance 2024-41 and revised September 12, 2024.