Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
collection services are provided to residents under a franchise system that
limits the number of companies authorized to provide service. The city assigns
each company a section of the city and also regulates the rates companies are
allowed to charge, determined through a comprehensive rate study (Hong,
Adams, and Love 1993; Hong and Adams 1999; City of Portland 2012). This
structure has allowed the City of Portland to promote high quality solid waste,
recycling,
and
composting
collection
services
while
simultaneously
maximizing recycling participation and recovery.
A downfall to implementing Scenario 2 is that 14 independent solid waste
companies would lose their customer base in the City of Altoona and this
could impact the local economy by possibly putting small collection
companies out of business. However, a reduction in the number of companies
could potentially save households approximately $7.50US per month. This
translates to a savings of 1.75US million dollars each year (19,473 households
* 12 months * $7.50US). Households could invest this savings back into local
economy. With Scenario 2, one must weigh the elimination of collection
companies against reducing collection times and distances which ultimately
improves air and noise pollution and road degradation.
There are two local companies that work within the City of Altoona that
have multiple large sized haulers. Scenario 3, improved efficiency, provides a
realistic solution for these companies to complete solid waste collection within
the city. Implementing this scenario would reduce collection time, distance
traveled, and trips to transfer station by 51.7, 76.6, and 70.7 percent compared
to Scenario 1. These savings are among the highest found in academic
literature related to GIS optimization of solid waste collection. The largest
savings were noted in the study performed by Apaydin and Gonullu (2008).
They applied a shortest path model within GIS to Trabzon City, Turkey and
noted a decrease of 44.3 and 24.6 percent in route time and route distant for
nine routes in 26 districts. The differences in savings between this research
and Apaydin and Gonullu (2008) can be attributed to either model design or
the current collection system in the City of Altoona is among the most
unorganized.
Results from this research demonstrate that city officials must address
solid waste collection. At a minimum they should implement a collection
system similar to Scenario 2. This not only provides savings in terms of
collection time and distance traveled, it will allow officials to better monitor
and enforce curbside collection, especially recyclables. Solid waste companies
and city residents could then be held more accountable. Also, the exact
locations of each company's customers are known with scenarios 2 and 3. This
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