Four SU60 vacuum units from Trilo are the latest additions to the City of Wolverhampton Council’s fleet, making the task of leaf collection much easier. At just shy of five million square metres in area, the grounds maintenance and street cleansing operation is certainly ‘large in scale’. The 131-person team, including six dedicated grass cutting teams, is headed by Citywide Area Manager for Environmental Services Richard Macvicar.
“Our leafing period usually lasts from October through to Christmas and the New Year,” explains Richard, who has been in his current role for 26 years. “During this time, the mechanical road sweepers are out, but trying to collect all the leaves saw them blocking up quite quickly, so we looked around for something that could be used in conjunction with our current activities.”
The team had experience of Trilo equipment, and recognising its reliability and effectiveness, Richard went to local dealer Oakleys for a demonstration: “We looked at a few alternatives at Saltex, but after seeing the SU60 on demonstration, together with our past experience, we had no problem in placing the order.” The council took delivery of two units at the beginning of 2017, and another two in the autumn, split between the two city depots. They went into the leafing period with four units ready for full-time operation, shared between the parks, highways and street cleansing teams.
“The Trilo SU60’s are towable on a general license and can be detached and easily manoeuvred for easy transportation around the yard and out in the field. The manual wonderhose helps us get to space-restricted areas, with the size and capacity of the machine ideal for roadside work, where you’re additionally restricted by traffic and pedestrians. As planned it’s also been great working alongside our road sweepers, which gather the leaves into piles before the Trilo’s come along and collect them.”
Final word from Richard: “For many years, the lads swore by our previous Trilo unit for leaf collection. This doesn’t look like it’ll change now with our new fleet – my supervisor on the ground said the operation over 2017/18 had never gone so well.”