Philly released the 2019 Mechanical Broom Street Cleaning Evaluation, which is a report and review of their 2019 pilot program.
The pilot program was operating in different neighborhoods, which include: West Philadelphia, Parkside Avenue to Lancaster Avenue from 52nd Street to Girard Avenue; Southwest Philadelphia, Woodland Avenue to Kingsessing Avenue from 49th Street to Cemetery Avenue; Kensington, 2nd Street to Aramingo Avenue from Tioga Street to Lehigh Avenue; Strawberry Mansion, Sedgley Street to Lehigh Avenue from 29th Street to 33rd Street; Logan, Godfrey Avenue to Roosevelt Boulevard from Broad Street to 5th Street; and South Philadelphia, McKean Street to Oregon Avenue from 4th Street to 8th Street.
For the program, the Streets Department partnered with GovLabPHL, which is a multi-agency team to research and evaluate the 2019 pilot program. The program helped look at the impact of the mechanical street cleaning pilot within those six areas.
One of the highlights of the results is that overall the amount of trash collected per day decreased, which suggests cleaner streets.
The average Litter Index rating declined in both pilot and non-piloted areas. However, it did decrease more in piloted areas. This indicates that there was more litter in pilot areas. However, since there is limited data, the study cannot distinguish if these are results of the pilot or citywide changes.
To measure resident satisfaction with the program, over 2,000 residents were surveyed. The results were collected by door-to-door outreach. The study reads that over 96 percent of residents in each pilot area supported the program citywide.
Meanwhile, 78 percent of them recommend continued sweeping frequency weekly.
