Battle Creek, MI Sign Regulations: Digital Billboards (2026)

Section 1263.10 never uses the word digital. The rules that decide whether an electronic billboard can run in Battle Creek are its lighting standards and the citywide cap. Subsection (b)(6) of the Billboards section says billboards cannot be illuminated other than by approved electrical devices in accordance with Chapter 1422, the Electrical Code, and that underground wiring is required for any illuminated sign permitted under the section. Such signs cannot employ flashing, blinking or oscillating lights, and any lighting has to be directed away from adjacent properties, passing motorists and pedestrians.

The Zoning Code's sign definitions supply the measuring stick for flashing. A flashing sign is one with an intermittent, flashing, blinking or traveling light source, including signs that give the illusion of intermittent light by animation, and a sign is considered flashing if it changes more frequently than every 8 seconds. A multiprism sign whose message changes more frequently than 2.5 seconds is also a flashing sign. Section 1263.05 separately prohibits flashing signs, animated signs, and signs not effectively shielded to prevent beams or rays of light being directed at the traveled right of way.

The definition of an automatic changeable copy sign covers electronically or computer-controlled displays using incandescent lamps, light emitting diodes, liquid crystal displays or a flipper matrix. Section 1263.09(b)(4) counts electronic message centers toward changeable copy area for commercial signs, but Section 1263.10 does not mention electronic or digital displays for billboards by name.

Subsection (c) caps the system: no billboard can be erected at any time when there are seventy-five or more billboard faces in the City. With Administrator approval, an owner removing a legally nonconforming billboard can transfer its square footage to a new billboard elsewhere. Section 1263.12(c) bars expanding, enlarging or extending a nonconforming billboard.