草坪对环境来说是可怕的。加利福尼亚的水限制可能最终杀死他们

几年后既又一次的干旱条件和decades of precarityrelying on imported water, Southern California has instituted major limitations on how residents can use water. Within weeks, residents will only be allowed to irrigate their yards once a week. Lush lawns and abundant flower gardens, your days may be numbered.

这可能只是开始。气候变化正在对世界各地的水系统造成严重破坏，并预测了西部的干旱状况through 2030at least. What’s happening now in Southern California could soon be seen in broader swathes of the West. Watering limitations could dramatically reshape the look of the outdoors.

新规则已由南加州的大都市水区，在洛杉矶，奥兰治，河滨，圣贝纳迪诺，圣地亚哥和文图拉县向1900万人供水。在4月下旬，它宣布Water Shortage Emergency除非居民从6月1日开始每周浇水一次以上。如果情况恶化，该地区可能会执行更严格的限制，包括对任何非必需户外灌溉的全面禁令。估计家庭每日用水中有30％用于户外灌溉，减少浇水可能是节省水的有影响力的方法。

严格的浇水局限性和南加州夏季的热量可能意味着整个地区的院子将变成灰尘。但是，根据该地区工作的景观建筑师和设计师的说法，这可能是一个最终杀死有关郊区美化日期的想法的机会。从植物的可用性到新的浇水方式，施加浇水极限实际上可能会加速景观设计的当前趋势。

再见，你好，仙人掌

尽管每年降雨通常都在single digit inches, greater Los Angeles is still known for its lush yards and broad fields of grass. Thirsty trees like eucalyptus and ficus were planted with abandon in decades past, and though the region’s environmentally minded have been opting for succulents and cacti, green lawns make up the front yards of communities from Beverly Hills to Pasadena to Laguna Beach.

景观设计师米娅·莱勒（Mia Lehrer）表示，新的限制可以帮助更多的人看到耐旱植物的美丽。她的公司，Studio MLA，已经在洛杉矶地区设计了几个公园，这些公园包含能够承受低水状况的物种洛杉矶自然历史博物馆以外的花园和a hillside park overlooking downtown. Rather than vibrant but non-native flowers and jungle-like fronds, these spaces use native grasses like buckwheat, shrubs like manzanita, and trees like singleleaf piñon that can persevere through dry periods. Lehrer says some sections of the gardens outside the museum, planted in 2013, only need watering once every two weeks. “For many of us in Southern California over the last 10 years, the issue of how much water we’re using and what plant materials we’re designing into projects has been front and center of design,” she says.

But designing around water scarcity isn’t as simple as getting rid of all the thirsty plants and replacing them with species better adapted to dry conditions. Many species weren’t even available at commercial nurseries. “It was tricky finding the plant material,” Lehrer says of those early years. “Sometimes you had to grow them yourself during construction.”

但是现在，托儿所正在出售各种各样的植物，设计师和业余园林绿色都可以更轻松地将它们包括在其种植计划中，根据雷勒的说法。她希望新的浇水限制能使设计师和那些委托他们更开放的饮水限制，以便在新项目中使用这种广泛的植物调色板。雷勒说：“有很多树木进入市场。”

旧水又是新的

John Lesak is a principal at the architecture and design firm页面和特恩布尔, and he says there’s been a growing understanding among designers that drought-tolerant design is the way forward for Southern California. But regulatory and permitting issues have sometimes hindered the implementation of these designs. He points to water-saving techniques like water harvesting, such as the capture and storage of rainwater, and graywater reuse, which directs nontoxic waste water from kitchen sinks and showers into the landscape instead of the sewer. Some public agencies are quicker to appreciate these concepts than others, particularly those worried about people and pets coming into contact with potentially unclean water. “While the building folks may want to be doing this, the health people are saying hold on a second,” Lesak says.

These rules are beginning to bend. Lesak’s firm is working on a number of projects that are exploring new ways of landscaping without traditional irrigation. One is a pilot project for the San Gabriel Valley Water Conservation Authority that’s exploring new ways of capturing and reusing water on site. The project is a demonstration intended to show off new approaches to landscape design, and includes several wetland-like bioswales that can capture and absorb stormwater during the region’s infrequent rains, and large underground cisterns that can store recycled water for irrigation–approaches that can be tricky for homeowners to get permitted. The ideas being tested here could eventually find their way into residential yards and public parks.

这一提出的一个新设计考虑是，与简单的埋入灌溉线和洒水装置不同，这些方法需要更多的空间。在南加州这样的地区，这可能是具有挑战性的，那里的降雨很少，而且任何存储系统都必须能够一次一次性的洪水量几个月。莱萨克（Lesak）说，例如，新项目必须在可以埋葬水箱的较大区域进行设计。但是他说，有多种工具可以容纳现场捕获和再利用水。他说：“从镀锌钢罐到可以存储在爬行空间中的橡胶玻璃剂，有许多令人兴奋的储水技术。”

更灵活的法规

在规则的干旱条件下，批准需要耐旱植物，激励去除草皮草，甚至从水槽和淋浴中重复使用水的新法规，激励去除草皮草，甚至是从水槽和淋浴中重复使用水时，城市机构变得越来越灵活。

例如，在洛杉矶县，公共卫生部已发布了新的使用“替代”水源的准则, including the non-potable graywater from kitchen sinks and clothes washing machines. “It clearly called out how to address water reuse safely and encourages owners to address stormwater, graywater, rainwater, and recycled water without getting bogged down in red tape and bureaucracy,” says Kathleen Hetrick, a sustainability engineer atBuro Happold，一家在洛杉矶设有办公室的工程公司“它使行业中的每个人都更有信心，对水的重用是一个对项目的积极，而不是头痛。”

加利福尼亚州的其他政府正在做出类似的监管改进。Hetrick说，像旧金山这样的城市甚至正在探索所谓黑水的现场回收，包括冲洗厕所的东西,这样它可以用于灌溉。干旱和未来的水短缺正在促使城市更广泛地思考水的来源。Hetrick说：“有很多资源来制定我们需要的政策。”

The changes underway have been building up for years, and the imposition of the region’s once-per-week watering limits may be a loud wake-up call to finally put them into place at a larger scale. That may not mean the widespread disappearance of the classic front lawn, but in a water-conscious future, they’re almost certain to be the exception rather than the rule.