(I keep a fairly small lawn and the rest--other than the forest break between me and the road--gets cut by a tractor once a year.)
There are best practices for wildfire zones. Up to 5'/2m you don't want anything flammable, and up to 30'/10m you want to minimize vegetation (though some with appropriate spacing is okay):
* https://www.nfpa.org/Public-Education/Fire-causes-and-risks/...
Yeah, this exactly. There's a local horticulturist who specializes in replacing lawns with meadow-ish, native species setups. I had him come in and look at what I'd need to do to get there (no more mowing? Drought resistant? Fewer/no chemicals? I would like to subscribe to your newsletter...).
It's a lot of time/work: from getting rid of the grass, conditioning the soil, finding the right balance of species to thrive in your conditions, to keeping the invasive species out. Pretty much if you aren't regularly maintaining it, the same crud trying to take over your lawn will take over and smother your prairie. So...maybe it's 'less maintenance', but there's still good bit of maintenance.
This is a great idea.
> The simplest route is to just stop mowing and let whatever comes up after a few years stay there.
This is a horrible idea.
In most suburban environments there aren't a lot of native plants left around to be spreading seed, and most of the plants that have survived heavy artificial landscaping and will propagate on their own are weeds (often invasive) that are nothing like a nice native meadow. They will look ugly, have thorns, spread like wild fire into people's gardens if not kept under control, and make everyone hate you.
A native landscape will be less maintenance and use less water in the long run (if meadows aren't native in your area substitute whatever is), but it will take effort to get it into that state.