WILLMAR — Two Willmar City Council members say they want more information before they decide whether to support a request to buy a second street sweeper for the Public Works Department.
City officials say a second sweeper would help the city comply with a state pollution control requirement to reduce the amount of sediment, leaves and other materials entering storm sewers.
Council member Ron Christianson said he wants a written comparison of the cost of a new sweeper and the cost of renting a sweeper from a private contractor.
“I’d like to see something in writing,’’ he said during discussion at a Tuesday meeting of the council’s Public Works/Safety Committee. “It doesn’t mean that I’m against it, but it would ease my mind.’’
Committee Chairman Doug Reese and committee member Bruce DeBlieck voted in favor of recommending the council buy a $172,050 Elgin vacuum sweeper through a state of Minnesota contract. The contract expires April 30, 2010.
Jim Dokken abstained, saying he didn’t have enough information to make a decision.
Reese said the matter will go to the council at Monday’s meeting without a recommendation.
The possibility of buying the sweeper has been discussed for some time.
Willmar, with a population of more than 18,300, is among cities with a population greater than 10,000 required to obtain a storm water pollution prevention permit from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. The permit requires cities to reduce or eliminate sediment and other pollutants from lakes, rivers and wetlands.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Thursday, July 30, 2009
|
BALTIMORE -- Baltimore County police have released the names of three people killed in a fiery collision between a vehicle and a street-sweeper.
Darlene Helen Cardwell, 62, Lori Ann Cardwell, 37, and Katarina Ann Morrison, 19, all of Media, Pa., died in the crash that occurred shortly before 5 a.m. Monday.
Investigators said Thursday that Lori Cardwell, the driver of a 2007 Chevrolet Aveo, was traveling westbound on White Marsh Boulevard with her passengers on their way home from a trip to Kentucky.
As she began making a left turn onto Honeygo Boulevard, the vehicle crossed into the path of a street-sweeping vehicle, which struck her car on the passenger side. The crash caused both vehicles to erupt into flames in the eastbound lanes of White Marsh Boulevard, police said.
The 1996 Athey Mobile M9 Sweeper was being driven by Ted McMillan, 32, of Baltimore, according to police.
McMillan was able to get out of his vehicle, with minor injuries. He refused medical treatment at the scene.
Darlene Cardwell, Lori Cardwell and Morrison were pronounced dead at the scene.
The cause of the crash remains under investigation.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
TO some people just cleaning up the bedroom is a huge task. Imagine having to clean a whole city.
That's what Gerard Gleeson does when he starts work at 4am as Warrnambool's official street sweeper.
Beer bottles, food containers and even dead birds, cats and possums are sucked up into his truck.
"We start with ankle-deep garbage and have it all gone within two hours," he told The Standard this week.
He knows just about every piece of kerbing and more than most about CBD waking hours and nightlife.
Occasionally residents complain about being woken by the noisy mobile vacuum cleaner and mechanical brooms but most appreciate waking up to clean gutters and streets.
In a few months the noise will be a little quieter when Warrnambool City Council buys a new sweeper truck to replace Mr Gleeson's tired workhorse.
Its MacDonald Johnston cleaner mechanism, fitted to a Hino truck, has clocked more than 14,000 hours of work - considerably more than expected when it was bought six years ago.
"It's been a fantastic machine but with Warrnambool growing in size it has done more work than planned," he said.
"We also use it on road works and for cleaning stormwater pits.
"The vacuum is strong enough to suck up a house brick.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
|
Weijia Jiang reports that's about all the new information police know about the victims killed in an early Monday morning crash, involving a street sweeper.
It happened at the intersection of Honeygo and White Marsh Boulevards.
"They drove into the path of a street sweeper vehicle that hit it in a t-bone fashion, forcing it down the road for about 100 yards," said Corporal Mike Hill, Baltimore County police spokesperson.
The small Chevrolet Aveo the victims were traveling in burst into flames. Police are still looking into which driver was at fault.
The sweeper involved is part of the fleet at J&M sweeping services. Police say the driver had just finished a job in Towson and he was returning to the office at the time of the crash.
"This was a traffic accident where the other car ran a red light. The driver of the sweeper was driving, not sweeping at the time. He was not speeding. There's nothing he could have done differently to prevent this accident. My prayers are with the families of the victims," said Julie Kestner, owner of J&M Sweeping Services.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Baltimore County fire officials say three adults were killed when a car collided with a street-sweeper truck in White Marsh.
It happened around 5 a.m. on Honeygo Boulevard near White Marsh Boulevard at the White Marsh Town Center.
Baltimore County police say the car apparently turned into the path of the street-sweeper, but it's not clear which vehicle had the right-of-way.
The car burst into flames after the accident and was consumed by fire. The driver of the street-sweeper managed to escape with minor injuries.
Corporal Mike Hill says it's also unclear whether there were any license tags on the car. None were found on the vehicle, but Hill holds out the possibility that it may have had a paper temporary tax which burned in the fire.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
WENATCHEE — The question wasn’t whether to put a bond request for a new fire station on November’s ballot. That was a given. The real quandary for the City Council on Thursday night was whether to tack on an additional approximately $1.9 million to fix up the old fire station on Chelan Avenue.
Council members decided against it, and instead approved an $11.7 general obligation bond to buy land and build a new fire station on Springwater Avenue.
Wenatchee Fire Chief Stan Smoke and Assistant Chief Mark Yaple had approached the council with two alternatives for November’s ballot: the $11.7 bond, or a $13.7 million bond, which included $1.9 million to renovate and repair the 80-year-old Chelan Avenue station.
Prior to the vote, Kelly Lindemann, a Wenatchee firefighter and president of the local firefighter’s union, urged the council to choose the $13.7 million option. He pointed out that the aged building has heating and cooling issues, old windows with no energy-efficiency properties, and diesel fumes and noise issues.
“When the street cleaner is out at night, we all hear it,” Lindemann said. “Meaning we suffer from sleep depravation.”
Councilwoman Karen Rutherford said she wanted to include both in the bond request: “I think trying to get a grant these days is very difficult. We need both fire station sites, so I think it would be strategic including both.”
Yaple agreed with Rutherford’s points, but had a problem with bringing virtually the same request to voters that they had voted down last November. The failed bond, which needed 60 percent approval to pass, could only muster 58 percent. Yaple said many of the people he spoke with afterward said they supported a new fire station, but balked at renovating the old one.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Not a single brassy note has been blown, nor one running shoe taken a step up Brady Street, but work is starting to prepare downtown Davenport's streets to accommodate runners and revelers this weekend.
Public works employees took a street sweeper along the Quad-City Times Bix 7 course Wednesday and barricades are going up today in the downtown ahead of some of the early events, including the Bix Porch Party today at the downtown library and this evening's Brady Street Challenge and a new event, Walk This Way for United Way, up the Brady Street hill.
The weekend starts in earnest Friday, with the DavenportOne Street Fest on 2nd Street, Alcoa Jr. Bix 7 at the Quad-City Times and the Bix Beiderbecke Memorial Jazz Festival in LeClaire Park. Next comes the Quad-City Times Bix 7 race starting from the base of the Brady Street hill on Saturday morning and more music the rest of the weekend.
Davenport police have a request for visitors this weekend.
"We just ask if people are making the downtown area their destination, take a little extra time and have fun," Lt. Mike Venema said.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
VENTNOR – Beginning Monday, Aug. 3 residents will no longer be alerted to the arrival of the city street sweeper by the beep of a horn. Those who fail to remove their cars from the street by the time the sweeper arrives will be stuck with a $21 ticket.
According to Ventnor Police Capt. Michael Miller, for more than 25 years, parking violation officers would go down the street ahead of the street sweeper and honk the air horn.
“Recently, with more of a 24-hour environment, people sleeping at different times and push toward greenness, as far as noise pollution, we’ve had increasing complaints from residents who think it’s an annoyance,” Miller said Tuesday, July 21.
He said that in years past, he would get a few complaints a year, but recently the department and the mayor’s office have received complaints on a regular basis.
Mayor Theresa Kelly said people have complained that the horn was disturbing during breakfast time.
The city’s street sweeper can come by anytime between 7 a.m. and 3 p.m. Monday through Friday, when scheduled.
“I thought it was a nice gesture by the police department,” Kelly said July 21. “But if the police have gotten enough complaints, then I guess it has to stop.”
Miller said he sat down with other members of the police department and decided that residents think it’s more of an annoyance than an advantage.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
STAMFORD -- An army of yellow shirts descended upon the South End early Saturday and pulled weeds, disposed of old, discarded household appliances and swept the streets of the changing waterfront community.
"I had no idea 250 people were going to show up, and I organized the thing," said Matt Dalio, who initiated the cleanup effort as an associate with Harbor Point. The South End developer led the event, which featured volunteers who wore yellow shirts as they worked.
"When you come out here, and you see all the yellow shirts walking through the community, there's a sense of camaraderie," Dalio said.
South End residents and community members met Saturday morning to clean up their neighborhood. They cleared litter, placed plants along streets and fixed fences in an attempt to beautify the industrial and residential community, which is slated for an even bigger overhaul. It's the site of the $3 billion Harbor Point development and its proposed 4,000 housing units, as well as new retail and office space.
Local landscapers offered their services as did dozens of South End residents. Parents and students from Waterside School -- a private elementary school on the West Side that recently proposed constructing a new building in the South End -- and local churches and community centers also pitched in. They met at 8 a.m. and worked until a noon barbecue in the Harbor Point office courtyard at the end of Ludlow Street.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
OLYMPIA – The Parking and Business Improvement Area, a downtown beautification group that requires businesses to pay fees, could cut its budget by 30 percent next year. However, the group is soldiering on with a new marketing campaign despite the recession.
The PBIA’s proposed 2010 budget is $100,000, down from $143,500 this year. Downtown cleaning would take the biggest budget hit, from $50,000 to $15,000.
PBIA Board Chairwoman Katherine Mahoney said the full-time operator of the Green Machine, a downtown street sweeper, has been notified that his job is being cut. Instead, the group will contract for cleaning services. But she was hopeful things will turn around.
“Entrepreneurs, at heart, are creative and responsive,” she said. “That’s what you see when things get difficult.”
The Olympia City Council’s general government committee will review the PBIA’s budget at its next meeting, at 5 p.m. Tuesday at Council Chambers, 900 Plum St. S.E. The full council has the final say on the budget.
The cut isn’t as big as it looks. Mahoney said the budget typically is $125,000 per year. Ruthie Snyder, a city code-enforcement officer and staffer for the PBIA, said money from the 2008 budget was moved into the 2009 budget for marketing, resulting in the higher $143,500 figure.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- A Department of Transportation driver said a woman side-swiped him overnight Friday, and she ended up crashing down to an embankment.
It happened on Interstate 77 southbound to Interstate 85 at about 2 a.m.
The DOT driver said he was driving a truck that protects a sweeper truck when a woman in an SUV tried to go around it on one side. He said she then swerved and tried to go around it on the other side.
The woman in the SUV clipped the side of the truck, tore off part of the side of the SUV and crashed down an embankment.
The DOT driver said he walked down the embankment to help the woman. She was taken to the hospital, but her condition was not released.
Investigators have not said if she will face any charges.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Baker City is fast asleep, but the man known as Tiny is just getting acquainted with his day. A black sheen spans the sky showing it is hours from dawn, and the clock reveals a touch after 3 a.m.
Steve Moudy doesn't mind the hour. He's scoping out the town's streets. In particular he is searching for potential obstructions. A cluster of parked cars, perhaps, or a tree branch overhanging the street. His eyes are peeled for rocks, dirt and dust, too. You probably never even know he's there. Few do.
But Tiny serves an important purpose in Baker City. He does something many fail to notice and often take for granted. He sweeps the streets. And he loves it.
"I've worked for a lot of people and Baker City is absolutely the best job I've had," says Tiny, who received the nickname about 30 years ago from a co-worker at Ellingson Lumber Co. who himself went by "Possum."
Protected inside the cabin from the constant howling of his powerful machine, Tiny loses himself in his thoughts. It's different up there — quiet, serene even.
This placidity is something he takes advantage of. He plans his route in a detailed way. He marvels at gorgeous sunrises. And he ponders plenty.
After eight years as the street sweeper for the city's public works department, Tiny has come to realize that this sense of peace is one of the greatest perks of his job.
"I'm the kind of guy that lives in my head," Tiny says. "You spend eight to 10 hours a day driving 2 mph."
In a lot of ways, Tiny is just the kind of guy you might expect to operate an oversized truck with brooms on the bottom and a sound like 100 vacuums sucking simultaneously. He's a big, solidly built guy.
But then again, he's also different. Less brash and more gentle, more kind and less abrasive. The truth is he's a character. He thoroughly enjoys the rain, and calls cloudy, rainy days street sweeping heaven because it's easier to collect debris under those conditions.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Thursday, July 16, 2009
|
CLEMSON — CLEMSON -- An $80,000 street-sweeping machine has been returned to its owner and an Oconee County jail inmate has been charged with stealing it in May.
The Westminster man also is charged with the theft of a Clemson University mail van on campus in June.
Clemson Police Chief Jimmy Dixon said the sweeper truck was found in woods in the Starr-Iva area.
Dixon said Timothy Bryan Turner, 24, of Westminster, who was in the Oconee County Detention Center on charges related to the theft of the mail van, confessed to stealing the street sweeper and led investigators to it.
Turner was questioned after an investigator from the Oconee County Sheriff’s Office got in touch with the police and said he might have information about the case.
Turner’s bond has been set at more than $83,000 the mail van case and he could face additional federal charges.
The sweeper was stolen May 19 at the Bi-Lo on Highway 93 in Clemson while its operator was checking the parking lot before cleaning.
Dixon said the machine is owned by Greenville Mechanical in Greenville.
He said there was some damage caused by the truck being driven into the woods, and some parts, such as a mirror, had been removed.
In the mail van case, Clemson University police charged a Turner with grand larceny of an automobile.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
DENVER -- It's not always easy to remember when the street sweeper is due.
Just ask Crystal Candela. She received a ticket Tuesday morning.
"It's very stressful," Candela told 7NEWS. "I struggle with money already."
Candela was among numerous residents who didn't heed the "No parking on the 2nd Tuesday of the month" sign in her west Denver neighborhood.
"If you don't move your car, we can't get the dirt and trash out of the street," said public works intern Emily Williams. "That dirt will eventually end up in the South Platte (River) or in the air."
Operations Supervisor Brian Nieto said debris can also be a safety issue. He pointed to recent flooding at Leetsdale and Oneida.
"It clogs up storm drains," Nieto said. "So wastewater crews try to clean them and we try to remove the surface material and debris. With vehicles in the way, we can't sweep under them."
"Denver Public Works doesn't want to issue tickets," Williams said. "Issuing as many tickets as we can doesn't get the street clean."
Williams is touting a new program designed to educate the public about the link between street sweeping and clean air and water.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
A man has been charged with felony DUI after an accident involving a street sweeper early Saturday morning.
Lance Cpl. Jeff Gaskins with the South Carolina Highway Patrol says that 26-year old Henrry Galeano-Alvarez, of Greenville, has been charged with felony driving under the influence after he allegedly was traveling in the wrong lane on Highway 291 in Greenville County and struck a street sweeper head-on.
Gaskins says that Alvarez was driving northbound on Highway 291 in a 1999 Ford two-door sedan when he struck the street sweeper, driven by 49-year old Stella Fenske, head-on. Gaskins says that it appears that both drivers attempted to avoid the collision, but failed.
Both drivers were transported to Greenville Memorial Hospital and their conditions are not yet known.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Texas Township - Pa. State Police have not yet issued a report on their investigation of a crash at the Route 6 Plaza, Friday.
At about 1:15 p.m., a Dodge Stratus and a delivery truck collided on Route 6 by the entrance to the Plaza opposite the access road to Wal-Mart and Home Depot. The car was left blocking the entrance to the Plaza with its passenger side crushed in. The delivery truck entered the Plaza parking lot and struck a parked Sunny Inc. sweeper truck, coming to rest against it.
June Utegg, the driver of the car, was taken to Wayne Memorial Hospital, said White Mills Fire Chief Ken Batzel. Bill Perry of Moscow, who was operating the delivery ruck for Epsco, said he was just shakened up.
Perry said he was just driving east on Route 6 when the car came out from Wal-Mart Drive. “Then I ended up here. What happened between there and here I don’t know, it happened so quick,” he said.
The delivery truck’s hood was pushed up, damaging the windshield on the passenger side. Perry said he was glad to be wearing a seat belt.
White Mills Fire and Ambulance, Honesdale EMS and White Mills Fire Police were assisting the State Police on scene.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Sometimes, the most heroic of politicians get fooled by proposals that sound like they'll save the world but turn out to be terrible policy. The political organizers-in-training running mock superhero campaigns for DC Mayor fell into this trap, as many of them hastily jumped on a proposal from Adam Green Goblin to eliminate street cleaning tickets in DC.
The noble Adam Green was transformed by a chemical serum, adrenaline, when DPW "courtesy towed" his car around the corner to make room for snow removal. The new space had a different street cleaning day than the place he'd parked, leading Adam to get a street cleaning ticket. DPW also couldn't tell Adam where they'd put the car.
From that day forward, Adam Green Goblin began roaming the city trying to stamp out street sweeping tickets. He created a Facebook group arguing that the tickets are just a revenue generator for DC. He also added that Georgetown has no street cleaning (nor does Ward 3), making the tickets an unfair burden on residents of other neighborhoods.
It is indeed unfair for some neighborhoods to have sweeping and not others, but the solution isn't to stop cleaning the streets. Residents of the areas with street sweeping originally petitioned DC to start it, due to high volumes of trash and chemicals on their streets. Residents would certainly not like the way their neighborhoods looked if DC stopped cleaning. And when we don't take debris off the streets, it washes into storm drains and rivers, or blows into trees and parks. On my street, after DPW does not clean the streets for the winter, the gutters are full of tree material and some trash, and many streets nearer businesses accumulate a lot more trash.
The new street sweeper cameras, which have enraged some drivers, are also making a difference to DC's trash and pollution. According to testimony from DPW head William Howland at a January 2008 hearing, cars parked illegally during sweeping hours significantly impede DPW's ability to get trash off the streets. Each car forces the sweeper to go around, making it miss three parking spaces worth of gutter. Cleaning vehicles collect 10 pounds of oil and grease per mile swept, and 3 pounds each of nitrogen and phosphorus.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
PROVINCETOWN - The process of cleaning up puddles of raw sewage that had collected along Commercial Street began in earnest Tuesday, as engineers worked simultaneously to finish repairing a broken pipe that caused the municipal sewer system to fail over the busy July 4th weekend.
The town’s lone street sweeper was making its way along main and side streets Tuesday morning, followed by health department staff spraying chlorine bleach on the street to disinfect the contamination.
“With oversight from the health agent and the health and environmental affairs manager, the disinfection process will continue throughout the day as each vacuum structure is pumped,” town manager Sharon Lynn said on Tuesday. “Health and environmental affairs manager Brian Carlson has been in contact with county officials who have concurred with the town’s approach to disinfection. Further, the Massachusetts Office of Health and Human Services Community Sanitation Program office has confirmed that using a bleach solution is a standard and adequate means of sanitizing a sewer discharge to the surface in a home and/or on the ground.”
The four-inch hole that caused the failure – likely the result of debris in the system slamming into a vulnerable sewer connection – was found Monday evening in a sewer main running under Dyer Street in the east end of town. That section of pipe was cut out and replaced and the east end vacuum main, which runs along Commercial Street from Anthony Street to Snows Lane, was fully operational by early Tuesday evening.
Work was continuing along the west end vacuum sewer main throughout the night. Although the leak was in the east end main, the west main failed as well when the vacuum pressure needed to operate the system died. As a result, individual “controllers,” the valves that control flow from each connected property out to the sewer lines, failed at several locations.
The town ordered 72 replacement controllers but was still checking to see how many of the 350 controllers in the town needed to be replaced.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Craig Hanson is cleaning the city’s streets and preparing for the next flood at the same time.
The street-sweeper crews supervised by Hanson — a self-proclaimed industrial-engineering geek who serves as the city’s public works maintenance manager — pick up from 8,000 to 9,000 tons of sand, dirt, litter and small road kill each year.
In years past, the loads would end up in the local landfill, used to help cover garbage.
Not anymore. Everything picked up by a fleet of 10 sweepers ends up in an ever-growing pile outside the former Sinclair meatpacking plant, now owned by the city.
“Oh, it’s impressive,” Hanson says of the pile of sweepings. It must be 100-by-50 feet and 20 feet tall, he says.
This is the stuff that will be used, after sifting out debris, to fill wire Hesco baskets, which the city will deploy as temporary flood protection if the Cedar River should threaten the city with flooding again. The longer range plan is to build, with congressional funding, a permanent flood-protection system. Until then, Hanson’s pile of Hesco fill will continue to grow and be at the ready.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
Willie Guess said his job is to make "Philly look like Philly again" after big events such as Saturday night's Welcome America concert and fireworks show on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.
As the street department's waste collection district supervisor for city wide cleaning, he has done all he can. The streets are clean, and have been since Sunday morning.
But the massive stage, with all its lighting and sound equipment, won't start to come down until Monday because of overtime costs on Sunday, said security workers at the site.
Getting the streets clean, however, was no walk through the parkway. Late-night lingeres may have witnessed the crew of 40 armed with leaf blowers, street sweepers, street flushers and trash trucks attack the area after the crowds filtered out. By dawn Sunday, the area was devoid of paper napkins, crushed beer cans and plastic bottles left by the thousands who attended the festivities.
"I know I've done my job when people come out in the morning and say 'Wow, it looks like nothing happened,'" Guess said.
Anthony Ellis saw how "junky" the area was after he left the concert Saturday, but he took note change sitting on a bench near the parkway the next morning.
"It looks a lot different now," Ellis said. "They got a little ways to go, but it looks a lot better."
On Sunday morning, another crew started working in the surrounding neighborhoods where hordes of people walked home. They also did touch-up work on the parkway.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
In Randy Carter’s line of work, hand shakes and thumbs ups for a job well done, let alone being called hero, just doesn’t happen.
But that is exactly what took place Tuesday evening when he used his street sweeping truck to help douse a house fire at Musselman’s Lake.
“It was a stroke of luck I was there, saw the smoke and was smart enough to turn around,” he said.
Mr. Carter had just finished cleaning the roads around Lee Sand and Gravel south of the lake north of Stouffville and was headed south on the Ninth Line, when in his mirrors, he saw white smoke.
At first, the Sweepco street sweeper and road cleaner dismissed it as someone burning leaves and continued driving, away from the fire.
But the more Mr. Carter thought about the smoke, the more he got to thinking it wasn’t a controlled leaf burn. So he turned the truck around.
“It was smoking pretty bad and it looked like it was going to be engulfed,” Mr. Carter said of the small wood home at 14619 Ninth Line, just north of Lakeshore Road, that had white smoke billowing out of its eavestroughs and roof when he arrived.
With some assistance from neighbours, who called 9-1-1, cars were moved out of the way so Mr. Carter could pull up to the home and douse it with the 3,000 gallons of water left in his vehicle.
“I didn’t know what I was doing. I’m not a firefighter; I just clean roads,” Mr. Carter said.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - At the rate things are going, it may be winter before Anchorage's post-winter street sweeping is complete.
The state Department of Transportation says only one-sixth of the territory covered in the street-sweeping contract for state-owned roads in Anchorage and Eagle River had been cleared as of last week.
SmithSon Enterprises, the contractor who got the street-sweeping job, is trying to quicken the pace, but seems highly unlikely to finish by the contractual date of July 22.
The contractor says sidewalks have been tougher to clean than anticipated, and volcanic ash from Mount Redoubt has added another complication.
Read Full Article
Sphere: Related Content
|
|
Posts
