Pitkin County passes first reading of new lighting code aimed at preserving night skies; dark‑sky advocates, neighbors weigh in

Pitkin County commissioners passed first reading of a comprehensive rewrite of the county—s outdoor lighting rules on Dec. 18, 2025, moving the proposal to a Jan. 22, 2026 public hearing. Staff presented a compact, numeric code that creates three lighting zones, lumen limits for residential and nonresidential lighting, a nighttime curfew and a five‑year phase‑in for nonconforming fixtures. The rewrite was developed with a lighting consultant and dark‑sky advocates and is designed to align with international dark‑sky guidance.

The new draft replaces a code section adopted in 1999 that used watts as a brightness limit; the rewrite converts standards to lumens (which is the current industry standard) and adds definitions that staff and consultants said are necessary for predictable plan review and enforcement. The proposal creates three mapped lighting zones roughly corresponding to: remote/rural areas (LZ‑0), mixed rural/suburban (LZ‑1), and the more developed Airport–W. Maroon planning overlay (LZ‑2). The code sets per‑fixture lumen caps, an aggregate lumen allowance for properties based on house size, and a set of controls for nonresidential lighting including automatic timers and demand‑reduction measures.

Why the rewrit…