georgewuzheer's video: Stranco Transfer Station

My first weeks at Metarie Hauling had me riding along on a route on the northshore of Lake Pontchartrain. Pretty disappointing, two loads of around 9 tons of very scattered work in a rural/sprawling suburban setting. Not what I had in mind for the move to New Orleans. The short clip here is of the single interesting thing I witnessed in that time. Stranco is a local company which does all sorts of things; construction work, general transportation, runs some front loaders and roll offs, and operates this transfer station. I guess they'll get into anything that makes money, and the way this dump is run proves it. A single excavator with hydraulic thumb is the sole piece of yellow heavy equipment on site. I'm standing at one end of the elevated tipping floor opposite it. Trucks are directed to dump along its length by the operator, who then uses the machine to roll the transfer trailer and unoccupied yard spotter below, distributing garbage along the trailer's length and compacting it. Small pickup truck or trailer loads from contractors are hand dumped directly onto the concrete floor, where the excavator's bucket and hydraulic thumb can break down bulkier items. Mattresses are picked out and set aside. Clutched in the massive steel claw they serve as giant brooms, sweeping clean out residue and such off the concrete and down into the trailer. A second worker will swap out loaded trailers for empties, keeping busy tarping the full ones, changing tires, etc. A steady stream of new Pete 567s then circulates the trailers to and from the landfill. Minimal manpower and equipment used in a clever way for maximum efficiency. Very, very impressive. I apologize for the quality, clearly not shot on iPhone and the end of the clip I'm holding the phone at arm's length to get a better view, but I think the content is interesting enough to warrant a public video. I'm fascinated by the many permutations of waste transfer station, their comparative initial capital costs vs operating efficiency vs throughput vs overflow capacity etc etc. This one really stands out as a particularly elegant solution.