Water restrictions patrols begin this weekend

Water patrollers will be taking to the streets from this weekend, as Wellington Water looks to ensure water demand stays down when summer heats up.

Wellington Anniversary weekend typically sees a spike in water use as holiday-makers return to brown lawns and dry gardens. From around 130-140 million litres a day, the total supplied to Wellington, Lower Hutt, Porirua and Upper Hutt can jump to above 160 million litres.

Along with the patrols and gardening tips to use less water, ads promoting the fact that restrictions are in place will increase, the council-owned company responsible for managing water networks says.

“Even though we have restrictions in place every year, there’s not a high level of awareness about what and when they are – possibly because it rains quite a lot here,” says spokesman Alex van Paassen.

“On the other hand some people are very careful in what they use, and it can be really frustrating for those doing the right thing to see others just ignoring the restrictions – either accidentally or on purpose.”

Current odds and evens watering restrictions allow the use of a single sprinkler or watering system according to street address. Water patrollers will initially target high use suburbs and stop and talk to anyone they see watering on the wrong day.

“We’re not out to punish people. We need support to keep our water use down. The less we use, the longer we can defer new investment and the more we can keep costs down.

“People are increasingly aware of how lucky we are in Wellington to have so much water compared to places like Australia, where restrictions are taken very seriously.

“We have an opportunity to ensure we don’t need to go to that level. We can protect our water wealth, if we all do our bit.”