CDOT oversees all traffic signals, street, alley and viaduct lights, and is responsible for the installation and maintenance of all street signs.

Electrical Operations

CDOT’s Division of Electrical Operations maintains nearly 300,000 street and alley lights and more than 3,000 signalized traffic intersections. They also handle other high-priority and emergency requests, like downed power wires and damaged or fallen poles. Each year, CDOT handles tens of thousands of reports from Chicagoans about street and alley lights out. Most of them are completed within a few days to a week. CDOT prioritizes all-block outages before addressing single streetlight and alley light outages. Streetlight repairs are done equally across the entire city. No one area is prioritized over another. CDOT takes streetlight issues seriously, and uses many resources to provide repairs as quickly as possible. We encourage citizens to continue to report streetlight issues to CHI 311.

Sign Management

CDOT’s Division of Sign Management is responsible for the fabrication and installation of permanent metal signs on Chicago public way. The Division is also responsible for the management of private benefit signs and other ordinance signs. It works in close conjunction with all other CDOT divisions, the Finance department, and the aldermanic offices.