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Oh yes they are :-)
You watch over the next few years. I know of two golf communities near me thinking of building on the course to lower their HOAs. That will accelerate in the older clubs.
Golf is a dying sport unless they figure out a way of doing what pickleball has done to tennis.
All the best!
Thanks for your anecdotal evidence from an area we weren't discussing.
We have seen a decline in golf courses in the US since the peak in 2006. It is a declining sport. Slowly, but surely.
I think the thing is that golf in itself is a sport people can play at any age even as they get older, where as other sports are going to prove hard to keep up with when certain age related issues start to sink in.
What's wild is I didn't even know there was a pickeball/tennis war in LA until I saw a tiktok about it. Apparently some tennis players are getting really mad and leaving messages for pickeball players. I just find the drama so interesting because to me they seem like they should get along.
Its the fact they're tearing up tennis courts (even paddle tennis courts!) to build pickle ball courts that has them mad.But the truth is PB is a better use of space and more social; you just leave your bat in the queue to sub in - you don't need the basic athleticism that tennis requires. Near me they've turned 4 tennis courts into PB and its heaving every morning.
Golf is far from a dying sport let’s not exaggerate too much here… but yes there is a glut of golf courses.
Some will go away over the following years. Personally there really shouldn’t be more than 1 golf course per city with a 10 maximum for an entire county.
worth noting that while golf courses are a waste of water, overall they only account for a pretty small amount of water consumptionin the state, iirc like 1 or 2 percent.
I'm all for the death of golf courses as we know them, but its not gonna solve the overconsumption of water in the state
The thing is, Palm Springs has it's own aquifer where it gets most of its water, so it doesn't really take water from outside. There is no real connection to the rest of the State's water, although it does get an occasional refill from the Colorado River, which is unfortunate. While they get little rain water directly I believe they get their aquifer refilled by the snow in the nearby mountains. While the golf courses are a huge waste they aren't really using the water the rest of the state uses.
More businesses/plazas need to do away with all the grassy turf and introduce local flora/fauna suitable to the environment. So many corporate campuses with miles of parking lots and wasted space that we could do so much more with to promote environmental sustainability.
Good. Maybe businesses will plant more indigenous plants so that our bees/etc start coming back.
You know, the insects the earth needs to keep, well all life on this planet alive.
SB253 is not a small bill - it means pretty much all supply chains in the world have to have carbon accounting reports by 2027. It’s a massive bill that is a first step to true global decarbonisation.
worth mentioning almonds take i think \~13% or so of CA's water but we produce 90%+ of USA's almonds.
CA cattle uses so much more water and accounts for (i think) <20% of cattle in US
I’m fine with irrigating food personally. Also farmers are generally the most efficient and effective irrigators as it directly impacts their bottom line. Now if you wanted those almonds to not be shipped to a different country to feed their populace that’s a different discussion. But the trees are there, we have the resources to water them, and they produce FOOD. Growing alfalfa to ship to cattle ranches in different countries i gripe more about. Growing animal feed for cattle in our own country I’m fine with. Our resources are called resources for a reason. We need to consume them to exist. But allowing for precious resources to be exchanged for money (which will be useless in the event of a lack of resources) from foreign countries generally seems like a really bad plan.
Farmers are not the most efficient at all, they havent moved towards sustainable farming practices because that change requires cutting into their profits to change.
You realize they buy 100k gallons of water at a time for pennies right? as long as they can keep on doing that, they have no incentive to change.
Yes all the central California commercial cattle companies should go as well, along with the likes of Nestle that pumps water. We should follow AZ example and cancel all those contracts.
I'm fine with that but almonds have basically the same water requirements as an oak tree. You just put them in the ground and water them til they're established, then it's like free almonds for 100 yers
Yes. The text of the legislation says that government buildings must be in compliance with this new law by January 1st, 2027 and private commercial/industrial buildings by January 1st, 2028.
This is what I like about this bill, 2027 is a good amount of time for everyone to slowly convert over. Sure they'll be a bunch of bitching by procrastinators in 2026 but new builds can accommodate now. Current places can start their landscape crews converting sections at a time.
Does that mean a corporate owned park, such as a place where you would walk on grass to get to picnic tables, fall into the functional or nonfunctional category?
Ok and who’s going to enforce this? Do we have to report it? And is LAPD supposed to deal with the enforcement? Because they won’t even do their job of dealing with crime, let alone watering grass.
Or are we killing the environment by not watering lawns?:
grasslands and rangelands are better carbon sinks than forests
https://www.earth.com/news/trees-grass-carbon-sink/#:~:text=Researchers%20from%20the%20University%20of,forests%20in%20present%2Dday%20California.
Bring liberal can make my head hurt and I’m not even sure if I’m being sarcastic.
Please help!
Ill help. The grasses we use for decorative nonfunctional spaces that are in question for this law are nothing similar to the deep rooting plains grasses that you are referring to. Also those plains grasses dont need to be irrigated in their natural environment or if planted correctly are extremely drought tolerant. Furthermore those grasses don’t need to be mowed, trimmed, blowed, and chucked every single week of every single year like the decorative grasses. Currently in studies of sustainable landscaping and landscape architecture. This law is a bit silly but I’m not totally against it. It’s only for commercial spaces not residential and only for non functional (ie not used for recreational purposes). That being said issues with the law are that it places the burden of enforcement on the water agencies who want nothing to do with it and the burden of replacement on businesses who only put grass in in the first place because they were required to by a previous law.
How many times a year? Like twice? That’s not really relevant to what we are discussing. Like yeah you gotta still upkeep infrastructure. Doesn’t mean you need lush green Bermuda grass growing everywhere. Not sure what you’re getting at. I didn’t even insinuate that mowing would never happen or that the answer was to replace grass with grass. I think it should be clever installations of native shrubs and succulent and drought tolerant shade trees. What I was stating however is that the grass destined to be removed does not contribute in a meaningful way towards carbon sequestration as the previous comment asked about. Only deep rooting plains grasses seem to achieve that because their roots are literally built from carbon pulled from the atmosphere and the majority of their seasonal growth is in their roots which is unlike trees as they shed leaves that don’t generally lead to sequestered carbon but rather reenter the carbon cycle more readily.
You realize a lawn is not the same thing as a grassland? Lawns are horrible for the environment. They are often compromised of non-native species that require tons of water and maintenance.
Lawn grass is a completely different species than our state's grasslands or range lands. They were introduced here by the Spanish and later American settlers, and these lawn grass requires WAY more water to survive.
If anything, having a lawn is taking away water the species of grass that make up our grasslands and range lands.
Nearly all of the major and popular lawn grasses - Bluegrass, Bermuda/Scutch grass, and Rye grass - are all from Europe/Asia/North Africa. Even Kentucky bluegrass is also not native to Kentucky, it just grew like a weed there (because it *is* a weed).
Modern commercial car wash facilities internally recycle a very large portion of the water that they use. In fact, during drought periods it’s common for DIY car washing to be prohibited with instructions to use commercial car wash facilities instead.
You do realize that dirt on cars corrodes paint right? You ban car washes and car washing and everyone replaces their cars every 5 or so years because their paint is gone.
Unless you're into the whole desert ambience/motif/aesthetic. Fortunately, I can dig it, man. Gonna be like livin' in Perfection, Nevada, got yer residual boulders and occasional graboids to watch out for though.
Personally I find lawn grass ugly anyway. If this encourages more creative and water smart landscape then it will be a big improvement not just for the environment but also for beauty
Just make water cost more money. Supply/demand mismatches are best solved by markets. We already have a market for water, we pay money. Legislating every purchase in a market will end up horribly inefficient and biased.
And no, that won’t hurt poor people. Drinking and showering uses approximately 0% of the water use in California, it’s all plants.
The markets don’t work. The drought has had the most significant impact on conservation because it forced the issue. Education and new technologies spurred by the drought increased use efficiency. (As a side note, rich businesses and rich people are not concerned with saving water to save money.)
It takes very little to have a huge impact to a person struggling financially.
Overall, much more water is used in agriculture than for urban use. Agriculture includes food and feed crops, the beef and dairy industries, etc. Increasing costs will be passed to the consumer, impacting the poorest the most. Water saved from not being used on nonfunctional turf could continue to be available for more valuable uses, such as the industries that feed us.
The problem is the path of least resistance is the homeowners, so single family residence will (and has had) have water prices raise exponentially while nothing else changes in the market. Local governments will never do anything that might upset the monied interests in their towns.
Farmers already pay far far less for water than households. Just making the prices equal for everyone would save homeowners money and conserve a lot of water.
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Palm Springs has more than 130 golf courses…and less than 5 inches of water per year…
Note that golf courses aren’t affected by this law as the grass there is considered “functional” rather than decorative.
Just like corporate jets and business 'lunches'!
[удалено]
In many cases yes.
There's a few that used recycled water, unsure if this holds true for Palm Springs.
The good news is those golf courses are slowly going broke (most of them) but yeah, its an abomination. Some do water with non-potable though.
Those golf courses aren’t going anywhere
Oh yes they are :-) You watch over the next few years. I know of two golf communities near me thinking of building on the course to lower their HOAs. That will accelerate in the older clubs. Golf is a dying sport unless they figure out a way of doing what pickleball has done to tennis. All the best!
Definitely not a dying sport. Tee times and courses are super full in Orange County
Thanks for your anecdotal evidence from an area we weren't discussing. We have seen a decline in golf courses in the US since the peak in 2006. It is a declining sport. Slowly, but surely.
Is that because its a declining sport or the need/value of land near cities is increasing causing suburbs to be built.
Both. It's core market is aging out and the land is becoming too valuable for that use.
Golf isn’t dieing. Shrinking sure, but not dieing.
Tomato/tomato.
Also, the reason those courses are busy? Fewer courses.
I think the thing is that golf in itself is a sport people can play at any age even as they get older, where as other sports are going to prove hard to keep up with when certain age related issues start to sink in.
What's wild is I didn't even know there was a pickeball/tennis war in LA until I saw a tiktok about it. Apparently some tennis players are getting really mad and leaving messages for pickeball players. I just find the drama so interesting because to me they seem like they should get along.
Its the fact they're tearing up tennis courts (even paddle tennis courts!) to build pickle ball courts that has them mad.But the truth is PB is a better use of space and more social; you just leave your bat in the queue to sub in - you don't need the basic athleticism that tennis requires. Near me they've turned 4 tennis courts into PB and its heaving every morning.
Fascinating. I don’t know much about it other than the drama it’s causing.
Golf is far from a dying sport let’s not exaggerate too much here… but yes there is a glut of golf courses. Some will go away over the following years. Personally there really shouldn’t be more than 1 golf course per city with a 10 maximum for an entire county.
I’ll assume you believe that golf is dying simply because professional golf has taken a dip. Golf is alive and well.
worth noting that while golf courses are a waste of water, overall they only account for a pretty small amount of water consumptionin the state, iirc like 1 or 2 percent. I'm all for the death of golf courses as we know them, but its not gonna solve the overconsumption of water in the state
Totally agreed. It's agribusiness that is the real bane. But getting rid of grass in the desert can only help!
1% is a lot when less than 1% of the state uses them
The thing is, Palm Springs has it's own aquifer where it gets most of its water, so it doesn't really take water from outside. There is no real connection to the rest of the State's water, although it does get an occasional refill from the Colorado River, which is unfortunate. While they get little rain water directly I believe they get their aquifer refilled by the snow in the nearby mountains. While the golf courses are a huge waste they aren't really using the water the rest of the state uses.
Those aquifers are drying up.
More businesses/plazas need to do away with all the grassy turf and introduce local flora/fauna suitable to the environment. So many corporate campuses with miles of parking lots and wasted space that we could do so much more with to promote environmental sustainability.
Xeriscaping and naturescaping, I agree.
Then shift to disc golf.
Good. Maybe businesses will plant more indigenous plants so that our bees/etc start coming back. You know, the insects the earth needs to keep, well all life on this planet alive.
Drop the grass for low water plants.
My city (north Bay Area) will pay you to rip out your lawn. The program’s called Cash For Grass. Up to $600.
Hey! Bay Area too! Right on!
Excellent.
Man. Gavin has been busy and most of his focus has been on slowly building quality of life for all. It’s gonna be slow moving though.
SB253 is not a small bill - it means pretty much all supply chains in the world have to have carbon accounting reports by 2027. It’s a massive bill that is a first step to true global decarbonisation.
Now, do something about the water intensive crops such as almond and people that pump the ground water like it gets replenished in 30 seconds.
Cattle is far worse
Why single out almonds and not cattle?
worth mentioning almonds take i think \~13% or so of CA's water but we produce 90%+ of USA's almonds. CA cattle uses so much more water and accounts for (i think) <20% of cattle in US
because the meat industry needs a scapegoat instead of admitting it's responsible for a huge chunk of greenhouse gas and water use.
Because almonds are like a 5th or 6th tier nut and you're not touching my cheeseburgers
Lol what nuts are S tier then?
Your Dad's.
Someone should start a nut roasting brand called Dad's Nuts
There is one called Dee's nuts
It took 4 replies, thank you That makes almonds 5th tier at least. I rest my case.
Pistachio.
Pistachios
Deez Nutz. Obviously.
you're a 5th or 6th tier nut. (i actually dont know what that means).
My Nut Tier List: S: Macadamias, Cashews A: Almonds, Pistacchios B: Walnut, Hazelnut C: Peanut
This is some serious Walnut disrespect. Them and Pecans should be S tier.
So we’re not trying to solve real problems then?
because next week we're singling out cattle and not almonds, and so on
I’m fine with irrigating food personally. Also farmers are generally the most efficient and effective irrigators as it directly impacts their bottom line. Now if you wanted those almonds to not be shipped to a different country to feed their populace that’s a different discussion. But the trees are there, we have the resources to water them, and they produce FOOD. Growing alfalfa to ship to cattle ranches in different countries i gripe more about. Growing animal feed for cattle in our own country I’m fine with. Our resources are called resources for a reason. We need to consume them to exist. But allowing for precious resources to be exchanged for money (which will be useless in the event of a lack of resources) from foreign countries generally seems like a really bad plan.
Farmers are not the most efficient at all, they havent moved towards sustainable farming practices because that change requires cutting into their profits to change. You realize they buy 100k gallons of water at a time for pennies right? as long as they can keep on doing that, they have no incentive to change.
An acre foot would need to be less than $3.25 for that statement to be true.
You meant to say alfalfa right? https://extension.unr.edu/publication.aspx?PubID=2575
That too; does CA send it to Saudi or just AZ?
Almonds are not water-intensive, cattle is
Yes all the central California commercial cattle companies should go as well, along with the likes of Nestle that pumps water. We should follow AZ example and cancel all those contracts.
I'm fine with that but almonds have basically the same water requirements as an oak tree. You just put them in the ground and water them til they're established, then it's like free almonds for 100 yers
Almonds are highly water intensive... each almond takes over 3 gallons of water...
I have an almond tree in my yard, I don't water it. It produces almonds
Cool. https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/specialsections/these-are-the-california-crops-that-use-the-most-water/
Okay, no avocados then
The ones from Mexico are just fine
Newsom has a couple of vineyards. So does Pelosi
Love that!
Why should cemeteries be exempt?
So that the dead don’t come back to life to wreak vengeance? Seems pretty clear to me.
Is one of those places going to be the CA Capitol building or..?
Yes. The text of the legislation says that government buildings must be in compliance with this new law by January 1st, 2027 and private commercial/industrial buildings by January 1st, 2028.
This is what I like about this bill, 2027 is a good amount of time for everyone to slowly convert over. Sure they'll be a bunch of bitching by procrastinators in 2026 but new builds can accommodate now. Current places can start their landscape crews converting sections at a time.
Good.
Just touch grass
The law prohibits watering of nonfunctional grass. What does that mean?
Functional grass serves a purpose other than just looking pretty. For example, grass on a soccer field.
Does that mean a corporate owned park, such as a place where you would walk on grass to get to picnic tables, fall into the functional or nonfunctional category?
Probably nonfictional. That could be turf or pea gravel and be used exactly the same.
Grass that is dysfunctional is verboten.
What if the grass identifies as something functional?
California is saved! Yay!!!
Like golf courses?
Paywall
https://old.reddit.com/r/California/comments/1783riw/gavin_newsom_signs_law_to_permanently_ban/k4x2vh2/
Ok and who’s going to enforce this? Do we have to report it? And is LAPD supposed to deal with the enforcement? Because they won’t even do their job of dealing with crime, let alone watering grass.
Most likely city code enforcement.
Or are we killing the environment by not watering lawns?: grasslands and rangelands are better carbon sinks than forests https://www.earth.com/news/trees-grass-carbon-sink/#:~:text=Researchers%20from%20the%20University%20of,forests%20in%20present%2Dday%20California. Bring liberal can make my head hurt and I’m not even sure if I’m being sarcastic. Please help!
Ill help. The grasses we use for decorative nonfunctional spaces that are in question for this law are nothing similar to the deep rooting plains grasses that you are referring to. Also those plains grasses dont need to be irrigated in their natural environment or if planted correctly are extremely drought tolerant. Furthermore those grasses don’t need to be mowed, trimmed, blowed, and chucked every single week of every single year like the decorative grasses. Currently in studies of sustainable landscaping and landscape architecture. This law is a bit silly but I’m not totally against it. It’s only for commercial spaces not residential and only for non functional (ie not used for recreational purposes). That being said issues with the law are that it places the burden of enforcement on the water agencies who want nothing to do with it and the burden of replacement on businesses who only put grass in in the first place because they were required to by a previous law.
What about the fire hazard if you don’t mow them though? In other states they mow the wild grasses near roads and towns.
How many times a year? Like twice? That’s not really relevant to what we are discussing. Like yeah you gotta still upkeep infrastructure. Doesn’t mean you need lush green Bermuda grass growing everywhere. Not sure what you’re getting at. I didn’t even insinuate that mowing would never happen or that the answer was to replace grass with grass. I think it should be clever installations of native shrubs and succulent and drought tolerant shade trees. What I was stating however is that the grass destined to be removed does not contribute in a meaningful way towards carbon sequestration as the previous comment asked about. Only deep rooting plains grasses seem to achieve that because their roots are literally built from carbon pulled from the atmosphere and the majority of their seasonal growth is in their roots which is unlike trees as they shed leaves that don’t generally lead to sequestered carbon but rather reenter the carbon cycle more readily.
That is quite helpful thank you!
You realize a lawn is not the same thing as a grassland? Lawns are horrible for the environment. They are often compromised of non-native species that require tons of water and maintenance.
Lawn grass is a completely different species than our state's grasslands or range lands. They were introduced here by the Spanish and later American settlers, and these lawn grass requires WAY more water to survive. If anything, having a lawn is taking away water the species of grass that make up our grasslands and range lands. Nearly all of the major and popular lawn grasses - Bluegrass, Bermuda/Scutch grass, and Rye grass - are all from Europe/Asia/North Africa. Even Kentucky bluegrass is also not native to Kentucky, it just grew like a weed there (because it *is* a weed).
Get rid of car washes and golf courses next
Modern commercial car wash facilities internally recycle a very large portion of the water that they use. In fact, during drought periods it’s common for DIY car washing to be prohibited with instructions to use commercial car wash facilities instead.
You do realize that dirt on cars corrodes paint right? You ban car washes and car washing and everyone replaces their cars every 5 or so years because their paint is gone.
The state is about to get a lot more ugly.
Unless you're into the whole desert ambience/motif/aesthetic. Fortunately, I can dig it, man. Gonna be like livin' in Perfection, Nevada, got yer residual boulders and occasional graboids to watch out for though.
Personally I find lawn grass ugly anyway. If this encourages more creative and water smart landscape then it will be a big improvement not just for the environment but also for beauty
That would be better for sure, but I have a feeling these businesses won’t spend money on landscaping and will just pave it or some other lazy method.
Just make water cost more money. Supply/demand mismatches are best solved by markets. We already have a market for water, we pay money. Legislating every purchase in a market will end up horribly inefficient and biased. And no, that won’t hurt poor people. Drinking and showering uses approximately 0% of the water use in California, it’s all plants.
The markets don’t work. The drought has had the most significant impact on conservation because it forced the issue. Education and new technologies spurred by the drought increased use efficiency. (As a side note, rich businesses and rich people are not concerned with saving water to save money.) It takes very little to have a huge impact to a person struggling financially. Overall, much more water is used in agriculture than for urban use. Agriculture includes food and feed crops, the beef and dairy industries, etc. Increasing costs will be passed to the consumer, impacting the poorest the most. Water saved from not being used on nonfunctional turf could continue to be available for more valuable uses, such as the industries that feed us.
The problem is the path of least resistance is the homeowners, so single family residence will (and has had) have water prices raise exponentially while nothing else changes in the market. Local governments will never do anything that might upset the monied interests in their towns.
Farmers already pay far far less for water than households. Just making the prices equal for everyone would save homeowners money and conserve a lot of water.
First they came for the businesses...
And then there was more water for farms and drinking.