Street Sweepers Stage Comeback

In their battle against beach pollution, a growing number of coastal communities are turning to an unconventional weapon: street sweepers.

Once considered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to require a major investment of time and effort that offered little payoff, street sweepers have been gaining favor as technology has improved over the last two decades.

Sweepers of the 1980s removed litter and large dirt particles, but not fine, highly contaminated sediment that researchers believed could then more easily wash into waterways and the ocean.

Sweepers largely fell out of use until more recent innovations such as vacuum trucks led cities to reevaluate them. Now, many cities across Southern California are finding them an easy and relatively inexpensive way to meet federal requirements to sharply reduce the amount of urban runoff--a stew of pesticides, fertilizer, animal droppings, automotive byproducts and other toxic substances--flowing from storm drains to the ocean.

Seal Beach is proposing to triple the sweeping fee for property owners so that streets can be cleaned weekly instead of twice a month. If voters approve the measure this fall, the north Orange County coastal town would join Dana Point, Huntington Beach and Newport Beach, which have increased their use of sweepers in the last year.

Besides paying more to operate the sweepers, Seal Beach residents must also beware of parking restrictions--and the $34 ticket for failing to move their cars on sweeper day. That penalty was increased from $16, unrelated to the sweeping issue.

City officials believe that it’s a small price to pay.

“People have to understand that if we want our beaches to be clean, it’s going to be an inconvenience,” Seal Beach Councilman Paul Yost said. “We’ve had, as of last count, 18 [warnings of high bacteria levels] and nine [beach] closures within the last year.”

In Dana Point, city officials say they doubled the amount of debris collected from 43 tons to 86 tons in commercial areas, and from 172 tons to 344 tons in residential areas. That’s trash they assume would otherwise have washed into creeks or storm drains and out to sea.

The Runoff Report, a 1998 study by the Terrene Institute, a nonprofit environmental group in Alexandria, Va., found that conventional mechanical broom and wet vacuum sweepers reduce urban runoff pollution by 5% to 35%. A 1999 study by American Sweeper magazine, a trade publication, showed that vacuum-assisted dry sweepers could reduce the annual flow of sediment from residential streets 50% to 88%.

Street-sweeping is not a cure-all, experts say. Effectiveness can vary greatly depending on factors such as how often streets are swept, precipitation patterns, even the skill of operators. And sweeping doesn’t pick up some contaminants, such as oil and grease. Yet officials increasingly see it as one of the best of many tools available.

In January, the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board adopted a far-reaching plan to eliminate trash from the Los Angeles River watershed within 12 years. The plan could extend to every parking lot and rain gutter where litter accumulates before it is washed into the storm system and to the sea. Among other measures, it calls for increased street sweeping.

Southern California is believed to have one of the worst runoff problems in the nation, at times releasing a plume that reaches Santa Catalina Island, more than 20 miles away, environmentalists say. Runoff is considered the largest source of unregulated pollution, responsible for high concentrations of toxic metals in harbor and ocean sediments, and posing health risks to swimmers and marine life.

As the federal government increases enforcement of the Clean Water Act, which prohibits anything but rainwater from flowing into storm drains, cities and counties are directing more money and other resources toward keeping urban runoff out of the ocean.

Some have turned to filters and traps at storm drains, as well as low-flow diversion projects along creeks and waterways, which capture trash and divert hundreds of thousands of gallons of polluted water each day to sewer lines. But those efforts often require a larger financial commitment than some small cities can make without outside help, such as a state or federal grant.

Redondo Beach, which sweeps its residential areas weekly and commercial areas twice a week, is implementing an “Adopt-a-Storm-Drain” program. With sponsorships from corporations such as Chevron, the city hopes to collect $60,000 to $90,000 a year to pay for steam cleaning and grease removal on streets, parking lots and sidewalks, said Sylvia Glazer, the city’s public works director.

Street sweeping, however, can be accomplished with an investment of as little as $25,000 a year, say officials in Carlsbad, which went from sweeping major roads twice a month to once a week.

“It’s something that can be done immediately,” said Pat Guevara, Carlsbad’s public works manager. “We have less time to respond to [urban runoff] than some cities inland, therefore we have to be more proactive.”

Orange County began street sweeping in more than 70 unincorporated areas once a month in July 2000, abandoning a policy of sweeping only major thoroughfares.

“The cities have been really good about [street sweeping],” said Holly Veale, chief of staff for county Supervisor Tom Wilson. “The county was the one that was a laggard, and now we’re catching up.”

Environmentalists say it’s a good start, but more must be done.

“It doesn’t address the issue of people who over-pesticide or over-fertilize their lawns,” said John Hoskinson of the Surfrider Foundation, which promotes water safety. “But it’s definitely a positive step.”

Along the county’s 46-mile coastline, cities have watched helplessly as the Orange County Health Care Agency has either closed beaches or posted warnings to bathers because of high bacteria levels.

Seal Beach will hold a public hearing today to hear residents’ opinions on the proposal to increase the sweeping fee from 50 cents to $1.46 a month for single-family homes. After that, ballots are to be mailed to all property owners to vote on the measure.

For Laguna Beach Councilman Wayne Baglin, who also sits on the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board with jurisdiction over much of south Orange County, increased street sweeping is an idea whose time has come.

“None of us really realized that the accumulated waste on our streets was directly polluting our oceans,” he said. “It seems logical now, but we didn’t think about it five or 10 years ago.”

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Times staff writer Tina Borgatta contributed to this story.