By Cassie McClure
Published in the Las Cruces Bulletin 11/6/20.
Check your Las Cruces Utilities (LCU) Grappler mailing to confirm your regular day for trash pickup. For those affected by the change in their trash day, a notice will accompany the 2021 Grappler schedule that will be sent out at the beginning of December.
Due to the growth of the city, and future anticipated growth, LCU will be changing routes for 24 percent of LCU Solid Waste residential customers effective January 2021. The Grappler mailing will be sent out at the beginning of December.
LCU services roughly 38,000 residential and 2,100 commercial containers, Monday through Friday. There are currently nine residential routes and six commercial routes run daily. LCU predicts the Solid Waste customer base will potentially increase by 25% over the next five years. This information is based on the current permits and plan reviews for master planned subdivisions and the number of residential lots expected.
LCU enlisted a consultant, Easy Route, a subsidiary of Routeware, LCU’s on-board Solid Waste technology, to help analyze how routes operate in detail. The consultants discovered – thanks to data collected by the trucks over the last year – that some routes are overly burdened in comparison with others.
Robin Lawrence, LCU deputy director Solid Waste, explained that right now routes farther away from the transfer station take longer to complete and these are also the routes that have the most growth.
“We have other drivers that have fewer containers to service going to help their coworkers when their route is complete. Some routes have 616 containers, some have as high as 1,552,” Lawrence said. “Balancing the number of pickups on the routes will help spread the workload and will provide more efficient service that our customers see weekly.”
LCU can be reached at 575-528-3500 from 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. LCU provides services to approximately 100,000 Las Cruces residents and businesses.
CAPTION:
PHOTO 1: Check your LCU Grappler mailing in December. Some Las Cruces customers will have a new trash pick up day for both their solid waste and their recycling in January 2021.