Static MONTHLY Schedule is Needed

Schedules & Zones
1

Our Rachio controller is located in Las Vegas. As most know, the water restrictions for Vegas are being strictly enforced. The Las Vegas Valley Water District has a Water Schedule that is based on the Month of the Year. For our zipcode, that means:

Jan - Fri only
Feb - Fri only
Mar - Mon, Wed, Fri
Apr - Mon, Wed, Fri
May - Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat
Jun - Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat
Jul - Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat
Aug - Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat
Sep - Mon, Wed, Fri
Oct - Mon, Wed, Fri
Nov - Fri only
Dec - Fri only

My suggestion for achieving a Set & Forget FIXED schedule is to add the following functionality under the Rachio Scheduling tab > SELECT DATES:

  • Custom Dates (the current functionality)
  • add a Select Dates by Month option, regardless of Year (a checkbox for ea Month).

If the SELECT DATES BY MONTH option is selected, the scheduling would apply to all future dates in that month (unless manually changed). This feature would solve the MONTHLY scheduling requirement for many of us that are subject to jurisdictional water authorities. Without this feature, we have to modify our schedule every year for every month.

So as an example, using three schedules:
Schedule A: water Fri only
Schedule B: water Mon, Wed, Fri
Schedule C: water Mon-Sat

Then assign the Schedule to a given Month. In my example:
Jan: Schedule C
Feb: Schedule C
Mar: Schedule B
Apr: Schedule B
May: Schedule A
Jun: Schedule A
Jul: Schedule A
Aug: Schedule A
Sep: Schedule B
Oct: Schedule B
Nov: Schedule C
Dec: Schedule C

Absent this feature, I have reinstalled my old school Weathermatic SL1600 controller which has a monthly scheduling feature.

2

Sparked a side thought: What good are water restrictions anyway - don’t we all just end up watering more on our allotted days? I’m not advocating for this, but if cities really wanted to curb excessive water use they could introduce tiered pricing where it gets more expensive as you use more. We’ll start thinking of gallons like cell phone minutes… rolling over unused gallons…

3

It’s certainly not a perfect system, but in practice it has been shown to reduce water usage. I think it’s easier to “over-water” when you are allowed to water any or every day.

Also, many of us are effectively charged a higher rate for more water usage because of the water treatment fee.

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4

I’ve had those conversations with our water district here near Dallas and get deer in headlights. They have all usage information, so if we are in a drought set a quota based on some information like sqft of house or lot size, pool, etc.

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