Should grass lawns be banned in water-restricted areas?

Yes

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by Kevin Zahn

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This is difficult to answer in the affirmative. It seems that it would be rather unfair, or even un-American, to restrict what people can do with their property. So, I will say "yes," but under certain circumstances.

The first "circumstance" is that posted with the question, i.e., "in water-restricted areas." If you have ever been in this situation, you likely have had your local government restrict or stop the use of water to fill a pool, wash a car, or water a lawn. You might still be in an area where you have to ask for water at a restaurant. This has happened in so many places that legal precedents have been established for government claiming the right to restrict water use. What matters as well is that this practice has been done mostly by local governments, cities and towns rather than at the state or federal level. So if you live in an area with abundant rainfall, you should have different rules about it.

So, we generally accept the fact that when a drought or water emergency is declared, usage can be restricted. Why would water for a lawn be more important than other uses? It depends on the eye of the beholder; some see lawns as beautifying their property, others get tired of mowing, fertilizing, weeding and watering it and don't care that much. At least for this latter group, there are solutions available.

If you live in the drier parts of the American Southwest, you can have what we in Arizona call "desert landscaping." Your yard is covered mostly with rock, and the plants are native. Cacti are featured since they live off annual rainfall. Some jurisdictions have begun to require that all newly built homes have desert landscaping in the front yard, and your choice for the back yard.

In non-desert areas, you can still design a "xeriscape" yard. This uses native plants that are drought resistant and can thrive off the available rainfall. Sometimes it takes two growing seasons for newly planted plants to be acclimated enough that you can shut off the irrigation, or put away the garden hose.

Finally, you can install artificial grass. While this does not appeal to many people for aesthetic reasons, if you haven't seen the new brands of turf, go to a home and garden show and check it out. It's not your ol' Astro-turf anymore. This solution is expensive in the beginning, but is supposed to break even financially in about five years. Most of the new types of artificial grass are guaranteed for about eight years, and many say it lasts fifteen to twenty.

For personal experience, I can relate a few things. A neighbor of mine in Florida where I went to high school paved over his entire front yard and painted it green. He wasn't trying to save water, though, he just got fed up with mowing and weeding it, plus he had more parking space. Oddly enough, that part of Florida where we used to say you could set your watch by the afternoon showers, has now had drought conditions.

I went to college near New York City and we had a couple of droughts. The reservoirs in upstate were running low. The idea of a city that large not having enough water was scary. Pools went empty, lawns turned brown, and we all learned what a "military shower" was (wet yourself down, turn water off; soap up, then quick rinse, then off again, in case you are interested). It didn't get to the levels where people went thirsty, but I thought it to be a warning.

My first house in Arizona was all desert landscaped, front and back. No grass at all. I can't take credit for it because the house came that way, but I never planted any grass, either. I often compare that yard to that of my immediate neighbors. They had irrigated grass all around their house. They had no children or dog to play on it. They never came out and sat on it. No small children visited. It was simply to make their home in the desert look like "back home" in Michigan. Their irrigation system ran on a timer, and even when it did rain, they didn't bother to turn it off. A lot of people moved to Arizona and planted grass and flowers to try to duplicate what they had left. In the 1950's, doctors would tell a patient with serious allergies to move to the dry desert, in Arizona. They don't say that often anymore as you will still have your allergies, at least in the big desert cities like Phoenix.

My current house in Arizona is the first one in my area to have artificial grass. It isn't all over, just three small "play" areas for children and a dog. I haven't had it long enough to prove or disprove the claims listed above, but it draws a lot of attention in an area where water is precious. The rest of the yard was designed by a pro with xeriscape in mind, but I am still in that two-year period, so can't claim too much water savings as yet. I do know that my water bill is lower than many of my neighbors' bills, though.

Lastly, anytime there is a discussion about natural resource usage, or environmental issues, we seem to ignore an underlying issue. That is, how many people there are on the planet, and what effects an ever-growing population has on issues like the availability of clean water. There were about two billion people here when I was born and now there are six billion and increasing. I read that about one billion people do not have access to reliable clean water, and that is horrific. They don't worry about their lawns, though - they have more pressing matters.

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