MINNEAPOLIS -- With plenty of leaves still on the trees, Minneapolis crews are playing a tricky game with mother nature when it comes to sweeping the streets.
"It's this battle to start at just the right time," said Minneapolis Public Works Director Mike Kennedy. "It takes 17-18 days to do this and we have to get it done before we really get significant snows or the temperatures drop and everything freezes down and we can't get it up."
According to Kennedy, it's not just sweep it and you're done. There is a multi-step process to get the streets cleaned up.
First, the crews bunch and gather the loose leaves into piles and pick up what they can.
Then, a flusher washes everything to the curb, followed by a sweeper which comes through to finish the job.
With a dump every few blocks, the leaves are trucked to a commercial compost site.
"The amount of leaves we pick up will vary. Right now, we're not getting as much as we might in an average, whatever an average fall is. But we'll collect 4,000 to 9,000 tons of leaves in a typical street sweep. So it's a lot of leaves that we'll pick up," he explains.
Clean streets make for a nicer city to live in, but clearing away the leaves and grit and grime also keep waterways clean.
"As soon as the leaves fall they start to decay and release pollutants, and we want to keep as much of that out of the rivers and lakes and streams as much as we can," said Kennedy.
Much of the time, there is no filter between what is washed down the storm drain and what enters area lakes. Residents can help by bagging up leaves that fall after the sweepers come through and setting them out with regular yard waste.
