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“Why did you come to Casablanca?” “I came to Casablanca for the waters.” “The waters? What waters? We’re in the desert.” “I was misinformed.” Ah, yes, misinformed. You don’t have to be in Casablanca and Humphrey Bogart to be misinformed. These days, enough misinformation is floating around, even in the field of solid waste, to fill several automated sideloaders. One mistaken impression is that automated sideloaders were having arm-breakage problems because of driver error and improper operations and that some fleets are affected because drivers fail to retract the arms in time from oncoming and mostly inert objects. Asked about the problem, however, department of public works fleet managers quickly set the facts straight and clear up the misperception. What Problem? Only one fleet manager shares a major oops, about the time a driver didn’t retract the sideloader arm soon enough and ended up swiping a Florida Power & Light pole, which caused some outages for a few hours and a broken arm. Most other managers, however, say the arm breakage mentioned by Klientop is a negligible rate, just normal wear and tear from picking up 1,200 loads a day. That’s the biggest source of arm maintenance for the municipal and private-hauler fleets. As it turns out, municipalities are using the ounce-of-prevention approach: good basic training when converting to automated sideloaders. Another important aspect to training that fleet managers talk about are the special requirements each city has: Denver has narrow alleys for pickups and a lot of snowfall; Los Angeles has foothills that pose problems for the heavy equipment to navigate with enough power; Miami has high humidity and a heavy-duty hurricane season six months a year. It isn’t just a matter of training drivers to operate the new vehicles and become acquainted with the new mechanics. Training also requires that the operators switch their reference points from working on a three-man crew and left-handed drive on a conventional front- or rearloader. The new procedure calls for a single man driving on the right-hand side of the truck and operating a joystick or a Nintendo Game Boy–like push button console to pick up trash containers, which range anywhere from 30 gallons to 90 gallons. On top of that, drivers still have anywhere from 1,100 to 1,200 garbage pickups a day, and the race to cover all that territory still means a lot of braking and accelerating.
The story of automated pickup trucks started in Australia because of a manpower shortage. Moreover, because of the extreme temperatures there, trash-collection companies wanted to keep their drivers protected from the elements; therefore, an enclosed cab was a big plus for recruiting workers. Automated sanitation trucks made their way to the United States more than three decades ago. John Lemmons, director of fleet equipment and performance at Waste Management, has the long view about the business after 22 years. “Automated arms appeared in the late 1970s, and they have evolved over the years based on application and need,” says Lemmons, who’s based in Houston. “Cities aren’t as pressured to be profitable as haulers. So Waste Management utilized the new machines as they only required one driver. That was the biggest savings to us. These machines could do 1,200 lifts a day, or 120 homes an hour, with just one person at the wheel.” Municipalities and private haulers also saw another major factor in converting their fleets: Automated sideloaders offer a significant reduction in manpower injuries. Before automation, back and knee injuries were very commonplace as a result of all the manual lifting and hauling, which were costly in terms of medical payouts and manpower. Then there were the injuries that occurred as a result of men handling trash such as broken glass mirrors. Automated sideloaders eliminate all of these dangers. Moreover, there is the efficiency factor. The automated sideloader truck eliminates paper litter and objects flying off the back. Chuck Turhollow, the human resources division manager for the City of Los Angeles, who oversees safety, training, waste management, and emergency preparedness, explains his huge operation and the extensive training in the city, where automated loaders have been around for more than a decade. “We’ve been converted since 1995,” says Turhollow. “We have 535 sideloaders; we have 50 rear loaders we use for narrow streets and alleys. We have six vans for dead animal collections, and we have pickups for bulky items.” Even more impressive is the extensive training program the city has. “First of all, we hire from a civil-service list and get experienced drivers,” Turhollow says. “And then we have a 160-hour training program, and the first 30 hours are in the classroom.” After that, it’s real-time training, he explains. Drivers have what’s called inside-the-yard training, where simulated conditions and a course are set up. Next come 120 hours of field training, which includes a rookie route and a field instructor in the cab with the driver. The last step for drivers is going out on a real run with a field instructor following behind. Even then, when the umbilical cord is cut, field inspectors spot check drivers for a few weeks after the training is done. “After all, with a 14.5-ton vehicle, we feel it’s time well worth the effort,” Turhollow says. Two problems are specific to Los Angeles and the state of California. “One of the things that we have to deal with is the South Coast Air Quality Management District,” says Turhollow. This district oversees a strict anti-pollution code for engine emissions in the city of Los Angeles and surrounding Orange County in an effort to combat smog. In Los Angeles, 49% of the smog is attributed to on-road vehicles, according to the EPA statistics. “They’ve passed rules to eliminate smog, and when you have a large fleet, you have to convert away from diesel. So now we have what we call dual fuel,” says Turhollow. “In our foothill areas like the Santa Monica Mountains, we use diesel to get those big trucks up the mountains. Otherwise we use liquified natural gas [LNG] for the fleet.” Now that Los Angeles has had so much urban development in the foothills, the sanitation department has 465 square miles to service with 800 to 900 pickups a day. To maneuver around the mountains and hills, the city had to have trucks built with two engines, one for diesel and one for standard gas. “The hills do cost us time on the pickups,” says Turhollow. “But we use Falcon-Peterbilt components for our trucks.” The built-to-specification dual-fuel trucks don’t come cheap, either. The city pays about $240,000 for each one, he says. The city also has to foot the bill for rising fuel costs, which means the cost per mile is getting more expensive. But one important aspect about automation is that it has offset costs by being more efficient in collecting refuse and reducing the number of injuries. Those costs always boosted operating costs. As for training, Turhollow says the older and younger drivers make the switch easily. “Our fleet cabs look more like a console game with buttons, so the younger drivers who are used to Game Boys pick it up fast,” he says, adding that all the drivers eventually get the ease of operating the automated equipment. In the Rocky Mountains, the city of Denver has its own special problems: a lot of snow and narrow alleys for garbage pickups. Lars Williams, the operations manager of solid waste for Denver, talks about the specifics of his city. “We have about 140,000 people that we service with 45 automated sideloaders. That’s trash and recycling,” says Williams. “We began with a limited number of pickups back in 1989, about 12,000 stops. And I still have some of the same carts. We started with Snyder carts, one of the early carts on the market, then went to Heil and then to El Monte in California. Those are all older carts, all cross-link carts, and 90% are still in use. Now we’re with Rehrig Pacific because it makes a linear plastic cart. The linear cart is more recyclable than a cross-link.” He explains that initially residents and Denver drivers were very much against automated sideloaders when the city first started to convert to the new equipment. “Residents were resistant because they didn’t want to roll 30- or 100-gallon trash carts up and down their driveways. But everybody got over it. It’s like introducing anything that’s new,” Williams says. Denver’s fleet of drivers gets its training from the manufacturers, who set up the programs for the mechanical training and operator training. “Nintey percent of our fleet is Pendpac,” says Williams. “One thing that we did when we went to the Pendpac unit is we decided that we would take out the left-hand drive and went to all right-hand drive. That streamlined it for us, including financially, because they’re $10,000 less. Our carts cost $247,000.” In addition to road and alley training, Denver work crews have to get used to the LED screen, a rear-view camera, a left-side camera for sanitation drivers to keep an eye on traffic, and a hopper camera so they can see where the barrel dumps.”
Of course, the big challenge in Denver is the snow, which creates special needs for the city’s equipment. For example, the city got 36 inches just in December of last year. “One thing we required was special traction, which prevents slippage on icy roads. We also have a cold-weather starting system. That’s a block heater that keeps the engine from freezing and keeps the hydraulics from getting cold. Having a heating block keeps the hydraulics working in the automated arm,” says Williams. Denver also went to Pendpac because of a collection feature that allows the truck to work the city’s alleyways. The city started using automated collections for its 100-gallon trucks in the alleys in 2006. “Pendpacs are good for the alleys. When we looked at all the other vendors, the top of their containers would kick back as the arm was lifting it. This was causing property damage in the alleys. The Pendpac’s arm goes straight out and pushes the cart straight up,” Williams says. The size of the city and the size of the fleet don’t really seem to matter, as far as equipment goes. For instance, San Antonio, TX, which is twice the size of Denver, has fewer trucks in its fleet. At the moment, San Antonio only has a fleet of 37 automated sideloaders—so far. “Next year, we’re buying another 60,” says Stephen Haney, the assistant solid waste manager of the City of San Antonio. “We have Heil, and we’ve had automation as a form of a pilot program since 2004. So our drivers do not have a lot of experience operating the automated sideloaders.” The San Antonio training program consists of short classroom training, and then the drivers have two weeks of two days where they spend four hours a day on a training track. Once they’re trained, the drivers have to be up to speed for 1,200 stops a day. The training track is set up with mock pickups, and the driver goes through the whole drill: operating the truck, stopping, lifting the arm, and then accelerating to the next pickup. Before drivers are placed on the road, they ride for two weeks with an experienced driver. Chattanooga, TN–based Heil Environmental, which supplies San Antonio with its sideloaders, has also established a training program for its clients. In fact, the company is busy setting up schedules for its clients a year in advance. Mark Guild, Heil’s director of marketing, describes his company’s process. “We have a person who goes from customer service to do onsite trainings. This person goes out on the roads with the drivers, teaches them how to get close to the curb, what some of the tricks are to make sure the driver doesn’t dump the trash on the side of the road but in the truck,” Guild says. In addition to that type of support, Heil provides technical training and has classes in Fort Payne, AL, and in Phoenix, AZ. According to Heil, the company trained 2,400 drivers last year. Trainings typically last a week, Guild says. Haney says all the cities are going to the automated machines. “My knowledge is that everybody’s going to it, large and small,” he says. “The equipment is more efficient and it reduces operating costs. And it has a substantial impact on the reduction of injuries.” Automated sideloaders require more maintenance because of their hydraulic systems, he says. Instead of stress on human backs and arms, the stress goes to an automated arm that picks up 100-gallon cans 1,200 times a day. Maintenance is a critical issue, Haney says. South Florida has its own set of problems: high humidity and hurricanes. Martin Dareff, the fleet manager for Miami-Dade County, which has a fleet of 177 automated loaders, says his requirements are unique. “We’re in a hurricane area. So the ability to manually load on the side of the truck was very important to us. For instance, natural debris like palm fronds and tree limbs have to be picked up and recovered manually,” Dareff says. “And we have terrible rust problems because of the high humidity. Once corrosion starts, a piece of equipment is dead. We have to make sure there are no pinholes or improper welding, which present an opportunity for corrosion to start.” Maintaining the Miami-Dade equipment falls under the domain of Ron Kleintop. “We have two types of sideloaders. One arm picks up and throws high. The other is a drop-frame design for manual pickups, like after hurricanes,” he says. “The biggest part about maintenance is using the best grease because we’ve got so many grease fittings. My favorite is Nevada Gold. It keeps our equipment working fine.” Miami-Dade contracts with Waste Management to do its hauling. Tony Abascal is the solid waste manager for Waste Management in Miami-Dade County and is responsible for fleet repairs. “I’m basically the liaison between solid waste General Services at Waste Management and Metro-Dade County. That covers 30 municipalities and handles the waste at over 300,000 homes.” Kleintop and Abascal know equipment, and both sing praises for Labrie. “We use Labrie’s trucks and have had wonderful success. We’ve been dealing with them for four or five years. First of all, the trucks have a three-year warranty. We haven’t had any major problems with them,” says Kleintop. As far as training goes, Kleintop uses the phrase “the Nintendo principle.” “We found that when we had to retrain people from the rearloaders to the automated, the older drivers were not so flexible going from the older gears to joystick,” Kleintop says. “For the younger drivers it was a video game.” Miami-Dade is still converting its equipment with about 75% of the county done. “Automation startup is very costly,” Kleintop says. “Year two or three is where it breaks even. We’ve had very few failures of our equipment.” Labrie, which is proud of its product, loves to hear managers say things like that. Skip Berg is director of business development for collection equipment and has been with the company for nine years. “We make a hybrid, and it’s not just for Miami. It has dual ability,” Berg says. “Lots of people make a straight-frame truck. Lots of people make a drop-frame for manual collection on a single-man truck. The Labrie hybrid is an automated collector with manual capability. That’s what a hybrid is: It works as a fully automated truck, and it also works as truck for manual loading. It’s got the best of both. What’s unique is putting on an automated arm that doesn’t get in the way of manual loading.” This hybrid design also allows more flexible routing for whatever a city’s needs are, for whoever the client is. The drop-frame truck, for example, can be automated for a couple of days and then used manually when needed. Berg talks about an unusual design Labrie did for Cheyenne, WY. “We built a dual automated cart,” he explains. “It has arms on both sides. The cart is on the curb side, and the automated arms are sticking out of the passenger side of the car. The city has very narrow, one-way alleys and collections are made on both sides. This allows the driver to use a switch to determine from which side of the alley he needs to pick up.” Apart from the designs Labrie can put together, Berg talks about the advantages of automation. “The training for all of the automated operators is pretty much the same. The main feature is that it’s an improvement for the worker. Hanging on the back of a truck on a cold March day is not a lot of fun for the employee,” he says. As a result of automation, the hiring has changed. Some of the workforce is now made up of older workers and women because the physical requirements have changed. “Some of our best operators are older workers, women. Once you get used to the joystick, it’s like playing Pac-Man. The whole secret is learning where to stop the truck so that the arm goes out and grabs the can automatically. It’s really learning where to stop,” Berg emphasizes. “The training is to help drivers get that requirement.” DeWitt Smith is a media communications specialist based in Ojai, CA. MSW - July/August 2007
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