enhancing your bottom line: waste and recycling collection vehicle routing optimization

8/3/2019 Enhancing Your Bottom Line: Waste and Recycling Collection Vehicle Routing Optimization

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Management

Enhancing Your Bottom Line: Waste andRecycling Collection Vehicle Routing Optimization| Gary Lima and Bob Wallace |

The wasTe indusTry has seen more changes than most o us can keep up with, not only within

the most recent ew years, but largely over the past

three decades. Most company owners and solid

waste industry management say the same thing, “I

remember when we picked up the trash and took it

all to the landll.” A ar cry rom where the industry

is today.

Now there are rules, ordinances, ranchise

agreements, municipal collection—processing,

transer—disposal contracts, collection service

constraints and other regulations that dictate what

collection service providers can and cannot do. For

example, diversion, recycling, green waste, ood and

organics, C&D, medical, wet, dry, etc. It also seems

the industry went rom one truck type to several

specialized vehicles, each unique and seemingly

needed in its own way. Keeping up with the routing

o all these services and collection vehicles hasbecome an important part o eciently managing any

organization’s or company’s solid waste and recycling

collection operations.

The economy has aected organizational goals or

solid waste and recycling collection or all lines o

business—residential, commercial and industrial—

in today’s market. The motto is, “Do it cheaper,

aster and with less resources and equipment now.”

Maintaining service levels, contracts and ranchise

compliance have become more competitive oten

eroding prot margins.

The rapid growth spurt, preceding the recent

recession, happened aster than anyone expected, and

it led to adding more routes without having the time

to create them eciently. This resulted in a wide

range o collection routes throughout the nation so

unbalanced and inecient that, now that the new

growth has halted, it is time or both public sector

agencies and private sector companies to stronglyconsider rerouting their customer base and begin

running their routes more eciently.

Route OptimizationRoute optimization reers to choosing the best

element rom some set o available alternatives.

Rebalancing routes or reducing hours and miles, it

involves improving feet and manpower productivity

and protability. Route optimization aects all aspects o

a solid waste and/or recycling collection service provider

organization. Whether private or public sector, ecient

and cost-eective feet and resource management throughplanning is the most important step in enhancing an

organization’s bottom line. Understanding all the

parameters and how they create impact an organization’s

service objectives allow collection service providers to

choose the right tools or the job.

To begin route optimization, reducing route hours

and miles driven are accomplished by benchmarking

an organization’s current operations and driver

procedures, then analyzing that data to identiy key

areas o needed improvement and make the necessarychanges. There are a variety o decisions to be made

with respect to collection vehicle routing, customer

service impacts, day o service changes, whether or not

to purchase routing sotware, GPS, onboard systems,

etc., and, more importantly, which proessional

experts to hire to assist in helping make the critical

decisions and the implementation o the needed

changes. One thing that is certain, those who invest

in route optimization will be more protable.

Software and TechnologyRouting sotware has been around or a while now

and is widely used; however, a large portion o the

industry still uses more traditional methods o physical

maps and pins to improve collection vehicle routing.

The most signicant changes have been in the

digital mapping technology. Back in the 1990s when

computer routing sotware was rst introduced, the

biggest obstacle was geocoding an organization’s

customer locations. This is the process o assigning

an address to a digital map. The problem was all

Route optimization

affects all

aspects of a

solid waste and/

oR Recycling

collection

seRvice pRovideRoRganization. Ecient andcost-eective feet andresource managementthrough planning isthe most importantstep in enhancing anorganization’s bottomline.

28 WasteAdvantage Magazine March 2010

Route optimization: completing the puzzle tosaving money. Image courtesy of CBF Wealth Firm.

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streets were not included or they didn’t have an address

range entered. One could use latitude and longitude

coordinates to place the customer on the map but it

wouldn’t route by the street address.

Back then, the biggest goal was to reduce the

number o hours it took to service all customers. Themore a person worked with the sotware and was

able to analyze the results, one began to realize many

advantages to using a program that used algorithms to

nd the quickest way to route vehicles through your

service area. As a result, the need or becoming experts

at benchmarking was apparent. The key is to break

down the processes and know the details allowing one

to manage better and make more inormed process

improvement and waste management collections

operational decisions.

Other advantages o the use

o sotware and technology

become apparent when a

collection service provider

organization is trying to

determine where the most

optimal place is to purchase

an oce or yard or their

vehicles. Some sotware oersgreat logistical uses or this

type o acility siting studies.

The sotware allows organizations to identiy the best

location or a depot in a service area or geographical

location. The right sotware also allows organizations to

review the impacts o adding a transer station or MRF

to see how it would aect drive times to and rom the

collection routes, as well as non-driving times—thus

being able to better calculate collection costs.

As stated beore, GIS mapping has come a long way.

Some haulers have already starting using Google Earth

maps in their routing processes. New technology has

been, and will continue, to be an important unction

or waste collection service providers (organizations/

haulers) in being as ecient as possible.

Routing Parameters and ConstraintsThere are a multitude o parameters that need to

be included during the routing process and the more

detail that is used, the better the results are versus

using estimates or averages. For example, having

actual stop times always allowed or routing more

stops per day. The same goes or travel speeds and time

windows—one can calculate the most optimal time toservice any given street.

Another area that plays a key time constraint role—

impacting driver productivity, collection vehicle on-route

time and feet maintenance—is the time at the disposal or

processing acility (transer station, MRF or landll). As

part o the route optimization, review the transer station,

MRF and landll trac congestion (scale and dumping

queuing line times) in order to determine an adjustment

in start times and changing load commodities. This can

be accomplished, in part, through the use o certain types

o routing sotware, allowing changes to the parameters

that lead to greater eciencies.

There are so many dierent services, terrains,

weather conditions and seasonal customer bases and

set outs that having a tool to help plan or these

dierences is critical to using labor and equipment the

most ecient way.

Route OptimizationBest Management Practices

There is no one method or way o producing

optimized routes. Waste and recycling collection

service providers look at this process rom many

angles. Some organizations simply want better driving

directions rom route optimization. They eel this

method will help not only the driver, but also any

relie or new drivers to gure out the quickest way to

complete their routes. Interest in this method becomes

particularly popular when uel prices increase.

Another method or route optimization is setting

up parameters to route all collection vehicles by the

shortest driving distance. The biggest dierence when

using driving directions or residential and commercial

routes is the sequencing o commercial stops. There

are multiple ways o accessing a commercial property

especially in strip malls and corner locations. This

means sitting down with the drivers and manually

sequencing each route. Quite oten, sotware cannotdistinct all the ways to access a property or know the

exact bin placement location needed or optimization.

Enhancing Your Bottom Line: Waste and Recycling Collection Vehicle Routing Optimization


Lessons LearnedFrom experience

Sta rom Stealth Marketing

(Stealth) and WIH Resource Group

(WIH) have been perorming

special projects or the last 15

years. They have seen waste

hauling operations rom Alaska

to New York, ridden with

hundreds o drivers, worked with

countless waste management and

executives, analyzed operations,

billing, sales and customer service,

saety and maintenance managers.

Most o the work related to

route optimization consists o

perorming route audits, vehicle

routing and billing audits, creating

new routes or optimizing current

routes and implementing new

programs. Both frms’ sta have

worked with GPS, GIS, digital

mapping, handhelds and various

kinds and types o route and

route optimization sotware. Both

frms’ client-specifc eorts have

produced millions o dollars in

savings and new revenue or

clients.

Some o the key takeaways rom

all o this experience, specifcally

rom riding on trucks on collection

routes and tracking productivity,

has allowed sta to see which

routes are most proftable.

Experience shows that it quickly

becomes evident in determining

who a collection service providers’

most proftable drivers, routes and

customers are.

Benchmarking is the process of continual comparison andmeasuring of known industry standards in order to adapt themto one’s own situation to improve performance.Image courtesy of Change Excellence.

Old school maps and pinmethods to routing.

Image courtesy of WIHResource Group.

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WasteAdvantage Magazine March 2010 31

Route optimization provides collection service providers the

advantage when bidding or proposing on a new service contract.

Knowing how many collection vehicles and hours it will actually take

to service a city or service area helps organizations set reasonable and

competitive rates.

Saety has become an important part o everyone’s business. Route

optimization and route auditing through driver ride-alongs, identies

many saety issues on route and once those are exposed, it gives the

collection service provider a better way o making changes to prevent

injuries or accidents. This helps organizations decide i they need to

put a helper on a truck or create a scout service or the route, increasing

eciencies, reducing on-route collection costs and improving bottom-

line protability.

Routing and Customer BillingRoute optimization also can be linked to customer billing (invoicing).

Knowing where a collection service providers’ customers are is one thing, but

knowing where the competitor’s customers are is another, at least in “open” not

contracted or non-ranchised markets. Identiy potential growth areas that would

make routes more protable. On–board computers, AVL and RFID are starting

to play a role in optimizing routes. Though each o these products has their

advantages, there is still room or improvement.

A Strong RecommendationThere are many ways to accomplish route optimization. When it comes to

enhancing an organization’s bottom line, take the time to evaluate any product

or service and realize that there are experienced people in the industry that

can assist you and your organization in route optimization, route auditing,

benchmarking operational process improvement and provide you with sotware

Modern map view of points using real-time GIS data. Image courtesy of EPA’s Enviromapper.

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Enhancing Your Bottom Line: Waste and Recycling Collection Vehicle Routing Optimization


and technology solutions recommendations and post purchase/back-end

support.

Additionally, and as a strong recommendation, consider the sotware or

technology service providers’ back-end (post purchase and product or technologyinstall or implementation) customer service support when purchasing routing

or other sotware and technology tools to allow time to use the sotware or

what is. | WA

Gary Lima is Founder, President and CEO o Stealth Marketing (Yorba Linda,

CA), a service provider or major and smaller haulers and municipalities across the

nation oering owners and operators unparalleled, specialized waste management

services. A pioneer o proprietary route auditing techniques and best practices, Stealth

Marketing is experienced in route smart, caps logistics, GIS, GPS and ESRI sotware,

digital mapping and geo-coding services, proessional consulting and policy and procedure

implementation, cost analysis services and special waste programs. Programs and

ndings are tailored to improve all areas o a company’s business, providing the ultimate

validation that operations are running optimally. This provides peace o mind to clients

and the satisaction that they’re doing all they can to maximize their businesses and

growing prots. Gary can be reached at (714) 469-3571 or via e-mail at garylima@

sbcglobal.net.

Bob Wallace , MBA, is a Principal and Vice President o Client Solutions or WIH

Resource Group (Phoenix, AZ), providing diversied services and extensive experience to

clients in both the private and public sectors. Bob has more than 25 years experience in solid

waste and recycling management, transportation/logistics operations, feet management, alternative vehicle uel solutions (CNG, LNG, Biodiesels, etc.), WastebyRail program

management, recycling/solid waste program planning and development. He has expertise

in the areas o solid waste and recycling collection routing and route auditing, disposal

and transportation rate and contract negotiations and strategic business planning. He

has extensive experience in conducting both solid waste collections and transer station

operational perormance assessments OPAs (a business improvement process). Bob

previously served as a board member or the Arizona Chapter o SWANA and has

served on the National Solid Waste Rate Committee or the American Public Works

Association. He is also a ormer board member o the Caliornia Reuse and Recycling

Association’s Global Recycling Council. Bob can be reached at (480) 241-9994, via

e-mail at [email protected] or visit www.wihrg.com.

Garbage trucks in queuing line at transfer station.Image courtesy of WIH Resource Group.

Sanitation engineers manual rearloading solid waste on-route.Image courtesy of Capital News Service/Maryland Newsline.

©2010 Waste Advantage Magazine, All Rights Reserved.Reprinted from Waste Advantage Magazine.Contents cannot be reprinted without permission from the publisher.

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enhancing your bottom line: waste and recycling collection vehicle routing optimization

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