Direct answer
Pickleball courts are small, are frequently built in banks, and are frequently built close to homes. That combination makes spill and glare at the property line the governing design constraint on many projects rather than an afterthought. Design begins with the court layout, the pole positions available, the mounting height limit and the boundary distance — then the on-court result is optimised within those constraints.
Who this is for
Park and recreation directors adding or converting courts, club and association boards, municipal facilities staff responding to resident concerns, and the engineers and contractors reviewing a proposal.
Inputs required before a conclusion can be reached
•Number of courts, their dimensions including the out-of-bounds area actually used, and the spacing between courts in a bank.
•Whether the courts are purpose-built, overlaid on an existing tennis court, or a conversion in which tennis play ends.
•Class of play: recreational, club, or tournament criteria named in the project documents.
•Existing or proposed pole positions and mounting heights, and any height limit from zoning or a covenant.
•Distance from each court edge to the nearest residential property line, and the direction.
•Any local ordinance governing spill, glare, mounting height or hours of operation.
•Voltage, phase, and the controls requirement, including whether courts must be zoned or scheduled separately.
•Whether noise-related curfews are already in place, since they usually determine the lighting schedule.
Why the boundary usually governs
A pickleball court is roughly a fifth of the area of a tennis court, and facilities respond to demand by building several in a compact footprint. Two design pressures follow.
First, poles sit closer to the play area and closer to the boundary than they would on a tennis court, so a larger share of the light leaving each fixture has a short path to a fence line or a property line. Second, the same compactness pushes designers toward lower mounting heights, which raises the aiming angle needed to cover the court and, with the wrong optic, sends more light toward the horizontal.
The design response is not a promise. It is optic selection, aiming, mounting height and shielding evaluated together, with calculated spill values reported at points on the actual boundary. Duvon does not publish zero-spill or zero-trespass language, because no design eliminates spill and no manufacturer can determine what a local authority will accept. What Duvon publishes is the calculated value at the identified point, and the assumptions behind it.
Where courts are converted from tennis, the existing pole layout was designed for a different geometry. It may still produce acceptable calculated results across the new court positions, and it may not. That is a calculation, not a presumption.
What gets evaluated, and how each figure is labelled
•Calculated maintained average, minimum and uniformity ratios across the playing area, at a stated grid, with the light-loss factor applied.
•Calculated spill illuminance at identified boundary points, with the point locations shown on the drawing.
•Calculated glare evaluation toward the identified sensitive direction, stated as the metric used and the assumptions behind it.
•Specified wattage, delivered lumens, optic, CCT, weight and EPA for the exact model.
•Listed ETL and DLC records per model, with identifier and verification date.
•Field-measured values only where a measurement was taken, labelled separately and never averaged with calculated figures.
Retrofit and conversion
For a conversion or a retrofit on existing poles, the owner's engineer must verify pole structural capacity for the new fixture EPA and weight, foundation condition and circuit capacity. Duvon evaluates photometric suitability and publishes EPA and weight per model so that verification can be performed. Structural approval of an existing pole is the responsibility of the owner's engineer.
What can change the answer
Court count and spacing; whether poles are shared between courts; mounting height limit; boundary distance and direction; the presence and wording of a local ordinance; the optic and aiming selected; the light-loss factor; the operating schedule and any curfew; and whether the facility is also used for tennis. A result calculated for one bank of courts does not transfer to another site.
Verification checklist
1.Are the boundary points identified on a drawing, and are calculated spill values given at those points?
2.Does the proposal avoid any zero-spill, zero-glare or zero-trespass claim?
3.Is the mounting height stated, and is it within the limit that applies at this site?
4.Are calculated uniformity ratios given, not only an average?
5.For a conversion, has the existing pole layout been modelled at the new court positions?
6.Has the owner's engineer been engaged to verify pole capacity for the new EPA and weight?
7.Does the controls scheme allow courts to be operated and scheduled as the facility actually uses them?
8.Are all figures labelled, and is the preparer and reviewer named?
Duvon's role and limits
Duvon manufactures the system, prepares the calculation, calculates spill at the boundary points identified with the owner, documents aiming, and publishes model records. Duvon does not decide whether a calculated value satisfies a local ordinance, does not perform structural analysis, does not install, and does not offer zero-spill or guaranteed-level commitments.
Sources
•Illuminating Engineering Society, Recommended Practice: Lighting Sports and Recreational Areas (ANSI/IES RP-6).
Next step
Send the court layout and the distance to the nearest property line for a spill and uniformity calculation. → /photometric-study/