Water Watchers Plan now in place

Tauranga’s new Water Watchers Plan takes effect from today.

The Water Watchers Plan replaces traditional outdoor watering restrictions with a year round plan to help maintain the city’s water supply, and provide everyone with clarity about how they can use water at home, at work, and in the community.

The city will ease into the new plan over the next two weeks with restrictions hotting up from December in line with the warmer weather. Sprinkler use will be banned completely from 1 December, however other methods of outdoor watering, such as handheld hoses with a trigger nozzle, are permitted all year round at certain times of the day.  

The new plan is in response to three dry summers in a row which have taken their toll on groundwater levels in our region and left the aquifer-fed streams that supply our city with water (Tautau and Waiorohi) at the lowest levels we’ve seen going into summer.

Find out more and view the full plan