Lisbon Lighting City Ordinances

DavidW 1486974930

Hi Brad

Sorry I have only just seen this. It then took a while to do some research to provide you with some kind of an answer. I hope it is not too late for you. 

I am assuming that the lights are publicity panels advertising the agency.

It struck a chord with me as I used to work for a Bank and remembered that we needed Town Council (Câmara de Lisboa) approval to put up this kind of publicity or lighting. We used to have to comply with a regulation which allowed our signs, known as a "reclame luminoso", to light up from the time the public street lights were turned on until 23:00 or midnight. I have not been able to find that specific regulation still in place for Lisbon but it may still apply and some town councils do still have it.

Most of the regulations address issues with noise and then the size of the publicity lighting permitted, or if the owners of a building permit it. For Lisbon you will find the specific regulations here:

http://www.cm-lisboa.pt/regulamentos

Look for Regulamento de Publicidade and download the .pdf file.It is Edital 35/92

There really is not very much about bright publicity lights but on page 3 you will see that publicity licences can be revoked for a number of reasons, in particular you would be interested in

d) Os que afectem a salubridade de espaços públicos;:  If the health of a public area is affected

You have a right to "rest" or sleep and, if it affects your health in this way, you can complain. You would probably need to demonstrate making your own efforts to deal with it (e.g. dark blinds etc.).

Normally, in the first instance  you would complain to the police who would be obliged to investigate. 

However, on the Council website you have the opportunity to raise a complaint online. Most of the site has been translated to English so you can read it here:

http://www.cm-lisboa.pt/en/services/online-services/in-my-street

Hope this helps. Many of these signs can be equipped with a timer which would turn the lights off or down after a particular hour so would actually save the Travel Agency electricity if properly deployed. May be there is a compromise there.