The watering days that came with your address

The Beat

A sprinkler starts at ten past seven on a Thursday evening and throws water over the grass and half the sidewalk. Three doors down the same thing happens on a Wednesday, and the two households have never discussed it. The last digit of the street number sorted them onto different nights.

Even addresses and odd addresses water on different days

Calgary's lawn and landscape watering schedule gives even-numbered street addresses, meaning those ending in 0, 2, 4, 6 or 8, the days Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Odd-numbered addresses, ending in 1, 3, 5, 7 or 9, take Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Both parities run inside the same two windows, from midnight to 10 a.m. and from 7 p.m. to 11:59 p.m.

The schedule came into effect on April 29 2026 under the Water Utility Bylaw, and the City of Calgary describes it as a year-round schedule rather than a summer one. It sits inside Calgary's Water Efficiency Plan, and the City's stated reasons run from spreading water use evenly across the week to supplying a growing city on two small rivers.

A condo or a townhouse reads off the building's street address

Apartments, condos, townhomes and office buildings with more than one address use the building's street address instead of the unit number, in the City's words. Where buildings in a complex have their own street numbers but share one irrigation system, the days come from the lowest number. The City's worked example is #212 663 Brook Place NE, which reads odd on the 663.

Hand watering and food gardens run on any day

Calgary's schedule reaches lawns and landscapes watered by sprinkler or automatic irrigation. The City lists everything else as allowed any day at any time. Hand watering a garden with a can, or with a hose and a spring-loaded nozzle. Watering the food you are growing. Filling a pool or a hot tub. Washing windows and pressure washing a deck. Kids running through a sprinkler.

New planting carries its own allowance. Fresh sod runs 21 days and new seed runs 45. A newly planted tree or shrub carries five years. A rain barrel sits outside the schedule altogether, unless the sprinkler or irrigation system draws off the City's water system. Anything going into the ground this season is covered in fall planting in Calgary.

The watering schedule applies citywide under the Water Utility Bylaw, reaching residences and businesses along with the City's own operations. The City's Bylaw team could enforce a $200 fine for infractions, and the City states that education comes first. Every cemetery in Calgary is exempt.

Stage 4 restrictions arrive in the middle of October

The City is replacing the Bearspaw South Feeder Main, and the reinforced original returned to service this spring at reduced capacity. The City's own line is that the year-round watering schedule helps manage that reduced capacity by spreading outdoor water use more evenly through the week. Connecting the new pipe into Calgary's drinking water system runs this fall, and the City states the work runs in three phases.

Work at the Shaganappi pump station runs from the middle of September into early October, with no restrictions anticipated unless demand spikes in unusually hot weather. The tie-in phase is the one to mark. The City set tie-in construction along the new pipe for the middle of October into early November 2026, with Stage 4 outdoor restrictions and indoor conservation required for approximately four weeks. The Bearspaw South Feeder Main pages carry the current window. Commissioning follows in the middle of November with no restrictions required, and the replacement pipe is anticipated in service in December 2026.

What Stage 4 stops

Stage 4 is the strictest of the City's four stages of mandatory outdoor water restrictions, and a restriction in effect temporarily replaces the schedule while it lasts. Under Stage 4 the City's tables set sprinkler and irrigation watering to no. Hose and hand-held watering of gardens and shrubs goes to no. Watering newly planted grass and new trees goes to no, so the 21-day and 45-day allowances stop with everything else. Washing a car outdoors goes to no, and so does filling a pool or a hot tub. Washing outdoor building surfaces and windows goes to no.

One row of the Stage 4 tables stays open. The City sets watering edible food crops as conditional, allowed any day and any time, by hose with a spring-loaded spray nozzle or by hand-held container. The tomatoes get water. The lawn does not.

Indoor conservation travels with Stage 4. The City asks for showers of three minutes or less, and for the dishwasher and the laundry to run only when full. Toilets get flushed only when necessary.

Before the sprinklers go on again We watch those pages through the fall and bring this one true when the date lands.

The City dates the tie-in window to the middle of October and names no day, and the Bearspaw South Feeder Main pages are where that day will appear. Outdoor water restrictions are announced through local news and the City's own social media channels, in the City's words, so the announcement will reach a phone before it reaches anyone refreshing a page.

Every one of these rules lands on a yard, and a yard is one item on a longer autumn list. What a Calgary house needs before the cold covers the rest of it. Our full neighbourhoods index carries the street-level detail.

Look at the last digit of your street number. That is the whole rule.