Early-morning median watering ends the sprinkling cycle

QUESTION: Please help me understand why the city chooses to water its grass medians just before or during the morning rush hour. I see joggers, baby walkers, dog walkers, people walking to work, old couples strolling along and bicyclists all forced from sidewalks by this sprinkling. I know watering in the early hours before the heat of the day is a good practice. But I fail to understand why the watering takes place at the most inconvenient time of the day.Isn’t it time to rethink this practice?
- Bill Theis
ANSWER: The city’s medians are watered in zones and watering begins between 9 and 11 p.m. Each zone is watered 20 to 30 minutes, and it takes 6 to 8 hours for watering to be completed. So the “watering window” would mean the sprinkling you’re seeing in the early morning is the end of that watering cycle, according to Kurt Schroeder, city parks maintenance, trails and open-space manager. The zones are huge, and it could take that long to complete the cycle, possibly up until 7 a.m. or so.” Schroeder also said that while the majority of medians are the responsibility of his department, there are others that are privately maintained.