Cedar City is the largest city in Iron County, Utah. Located 250 miles south of the state capital, it is the home of Southern Utah University, the Utah Shakespeare Festival, and the Utah Summer Games. The city has a population of approximately 36,000 and encompasses roughly 20 square miles on the western edge of the Markagunt Plateau in the Cedar Valley. Although the Cedar Valley rests on top of a natural aquifer, the city does not have access to sufficient water supplies at current levels of use.

Rural communities are often physically distanced from the water conservation and demonstration gardens located along the Wasatch Front. However, these demonstration gardens provide tangible examples of how water wise landscapes can look and feel and provide an opportunity for homeowners to gather landscape ideas
and inspiration. In 2019, Iron County Extension Assistant Professor, Candace Schaible, wanted to make access to such demonstrations easier for Cedar City residents by installing water wise landscapes in a new suburban neighborhood.

To make this goal a reality, she collaborated with USU Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning Specialist, Jake Powell, on an Extension Water Initiative grant to help design, fund, and install a water-wise demonstration street in the city. The two brought the idea to the Iron County Home Builders Association and one builder volunteered to take on the project. Working with local real estate developer, Alex Meisner Construction, the team created a series of front yard designs showcasing water-wise landscape design principles and techniques and then installed the designs at nine model home sites. Demonstrating water wise landscape design principles at the model homes has helped provide
homebuyers with water wise landscape construction ideas and principles that they may then apply on their own properties.

The nine home landscapes are helping to change the landscape vernacular in Cedar City and more water wise landscapes continue to be installed in the neighborhood. The project includes a website that details the landscape designs and will also share water use data from the demonstration landscapes over time. A series of associated courses and resources teaching and reinforcing the principles displayed at the homes is also planned.