With the City of Los Angeles implementing the new "RecycLA" program this past summer, I made several trips out to the franchise zones that Waste Management is now the exclusive provider (West and Southeast Valley) to see the transition phase during the first six months of this year. The first of the new CNG "Think Green, Think Clean" garbage trucks were not due to arrive until May, so we were able to find many oldies running around.
(0:00) - 206427: In April, Kevin and I went out to Sun Valley to meet the new supervisor there, AJ. He showed us who was out on route that day and this was one of the more interesting trucks to find. On top of that, he was working in an area we were very familiar with - Winnetka/Reseda. Once we got out to the area, AJ sent me the address of where Jonathon was working and called him to let him know that we were looking for him. Made it super easy to find and sure was fun to film. This was one of the first weeks where other haulers started to switch routes, hence why you see WM collecting Athens and Recology bins. Jonathon was one of the first wave of Recology drivers to leave the company and join WM, and this was actually one of his first weeks on route. Very fun truck to film, and I'm glad we found this one considering it's a former El Cajon Wittke.
(4:39) - 203025: Towards the end of May, we made a trip out to meet up with Eli. We first went to the yard to meet up with one of the supervisors, Gilbert, and he showed us where Ruben was working. Found him in Reseda in his usual truck collecting a new route with many Athens stops. He was revving really hard this time around because the outside controls were broken, but other than that, he said the truck worked really well. I am beyond glad I went to find him on this day, because less than two weeks later, they pulled Ruben's truck off route when a swarm of new trucks came in.
(8:04) - 633119 & 212873: There weren't many other oldies around and Gilbert told me there weren't any Diesels working around the Chatsworth area, so we settled on this truck after filming Ruben. Pretty cool to see a brand new LNG truck in 2017. Robert (FL) and Jeffrey (scout) had one tough route to work. There were many overloaded Dumpsters on this route so they took a long time to service and clean up each stop. Robert said he typically drives roll off and he said he's been filmed before which is really cool.
(10:44) - 263026: Back in March, we made an attempt to find the awesome Art Rivera but unfortunately, his route was pretty short at the time so he was already done. He started up the truck to show us a problem that was recently fixed, so I'm glad I got that on tape. Art has more seniority than others, so he only got called to work on Saturdays once in a while. Because of that, it was hard to catch him in action, and unfortunately we never got more footage of his baby, 263026.
(10:57) - 203028: After meeting up with Art in Chatsworth, we wanted to find another one of the four ex-WMX trucks and luckily this one was running out in Woodland Hills/Reseda area. The route manager on duty, Linda, sent me the address/area of where Ruben Vega was working and we caught him working the exact same route that Ruben Reyes usually worked at the time. Really cool guy so that was fun to follow.
(12:49) - 633119 & 263034: Following another massive shipment of trucks in June, I was curious as to what was still running so I met up with Kev Barajas and we tried to find some of the more interesting trucks left. By this point, there were less than a dozen Wittkes left and all the LNG Macks had been shipped out except 2. Only this truck and 203028 were on route that day, so we chose this one to find. AJ sent me the address of where Eduardo Corza (FL) and Jerry (Scout) were at and we found them around Valley Village. Very impressive teamwork - I was shocked with how well they were able to position the forks and dumpster on the scout and FL (best seen at 16:23) to ensure the Dumpster didn't bump into anything when backing up. We sadly lost them after the last clip due to stupid LA traffic. Two weeks after this trip, the last of the Wittkes were sent away.
Thanks to Waste Management's awesome supervisors for assisting us in finding all these trucks, and another big thanks to all the friendly drivers for letting us film! And finally, thanks to all who tagged along on trips out here - Kevin, Bryan, Alex, Eli, and Kev Barajas. Definitely some of my favorite adventures I've been on!
Hope you all enjoy some of the last footage I have of the oldies Waste Management ran out here!