A NEW fleet of grime-busting, street-cleaning machines is set to become a familiar sight in Leicester city centre this summer.
The city council’s new fleet – comprising two powerful street washers, three fully-electric machines that can wash benches, bins and hard-to-reach places, and six compact street sweepers, complete with two heavy-duty scrubbing attachments – has already begun cleaning up the city’s streets.
Purchased at a cost of £763,000, the new equipment will help the council’s hard-working cleansing team keep the city centre clean and tidy for the tens of thousands of people who pass through it each day.
Deputy city mayor Cllr Elly Cutkelvin said: “In an ideal world, litter, chewing gum and food waste would all be placed in one of the 200+ bins we have in the city centre, but unfortunately far too much of it ends up on our streets, creating stains that can be tough to shift.
“Keeping the city centre clean is a daily challenge, but with this investment in new, state-of-the-art equipment, I hope people will see that we’re committed to making the city centre a clean and welcoming place – and help us keep it that way.”
Over the coming weeks and months, the two new street washing machines will systematically clean every city centre street, removing engrained stains and the thousands of pieces of discarded chewing gum that litter Leicester’s streets.
Brushes at the front of the new machines loosen the gum from the surface, before jets of steam heat the gum, allowing a suction bar at the back of the machine to remove the sticky mess, together with the resultant dirty water.
The fully-automated process is extremely effective, but it also takes time. With the new street washer capable of cleaning around 800m2 per day, a deep-clean of Market Street, for example, took around four days to complete. The two machines will now methodically work their way around the city centre, until every street has been cleaned.
The three new electric washers are designed to wash grime off the streets too, but the versatile machines will also help keep the city centre’s street furniture clean.
Operatives will be able to use the built-in lance to wash down benches and bins, and clean grime from the nooks and crannies that the bigger machines can’t reach.
The six new compact sweepers start work at 5.15am each morning to ensure that any debris left behind by night-time revellers is cleared away by 8am.
With the addition of a special attachment, the mechanical sweepers can also clear weeds from the kerbside, while two scrub-deck attachments allow the sweepers to be converted into street-washing machines.
A contribution of £15,000 from BID Leicester allows the council to carry out extra cleaning in the city centre, above and beyond its regular shifts, with the BID also donating £5,000 to help fund the removal of graffiti.
BID Leicester director Simon Jenner said: “Funding from the BID enables additional hours of cleansing services to be delivered.
“A high standard of cleanliness has been identified as an important priority by city centre businesses, and these extra hours help provide a cleaner, more attractive city centre for everyone who visits Leicester.”
The new equipment is already operating in Leicester city centre seven days a week. Streets with the heaviest footfall, such as Gallowtree Gate, are cleaned at least four times a day from 5.15am, with all city centre streets getting at least one daily clean, before the cleansing team’s shift ends at 8.30pm.
People in Leicester can help keep the city’s streets clean by reporting any overflowing waste bins, dog fouling, fly-tipping or dumped waste via the Love Clean Streets app or website.
Picture caption: Members of Leicester City Council’s cleansing team with some of the brand new street cleaning equipment.