Bloomington, IN Sign Regulations: Holiday Displays (2026)

090(b)(3) of Bloomington's Unified Development Ordinance lists the exemptions from the City's outdoor lighting standards, and holiday lighting is one of seven categories on that list. 090(c) imposes on other outdoor fixtures. The exemption sits alongside similar carve-outs for temporary festival and carnival lighting, which must still be turned off within thirty minutes of the last event; emergency lighting used by police, fire or medical personnel; traffic control lighting; up to three flagpoles; and low-intensity bulbs rated at two hundred sixty lumens or less, which need no shielding at all.

Because holiday lighting is exempt from the provisions of the section, it also falls outside the general shielding, full cutoff, and light-trespass footcandle limits in subsections (c)(4) and (c)(5) that otherwise cap how much light can cross a property line, and outside the lumen caps that apply to multifamily and nonresidential parcels under subsections (d) and (e). The ordinance does not set a display duration or a start-and-end date for holiday lighting itself, unlike the thirty-minute shutoff that applies to temporary carnival lighting after an event; the exemption is written to cover the seasonal decoration itself, not a calendar window.

010, which brings the lighting standards into play at development review, permitting or a change of use, so the practical effect of the holiday exemption is mainly felt by commercial and multifamily properties whose base lighting plans are otherwise reviewed by the Planning and Transportation Department.