Over the past few months, LA has used its GeoHub open data portal to provide accurate visual representations of city data, allowing officials to better understand the problems of LA and how to most efficiently solve them. We've already seen the data portal used to better map out street closures due to construction, streets in need of repair, and intersections with high instances of pedestrian accidents.
Now, the city is turning to GeoHub to help clean up the dirtiest streets in the city. According to the LA Times, the city's Bureau of Sanitation has just unveiled CleanStat, a comprehensive database that maps out the street cleaning needs of every street and alley in LA. Officials assessed over 9,000 miles of LA streets, grading them for cleanliness and compiled that information in the CleanStat database. CleanStat will give the sanitation bureau a better idea of how to "intelligently deploy " its resources to the streets most in need of cleaning. The city's goal is to have all of its dirtiest streets cleaned by 2018.
Last summer, the Bureau of Sanitation started sending out ten inspectors to assess the condition of each city block in LA. Based on the amount of loose litter, bulky items, weeds, and illegal dumping that inspectors found there, each street was graded with a 1, 2, or a failing grade of 3. With that information entered into the CleanStat database, a clearer picture of LA street sanitation emerged.
When they finished, sanitation officials found that more than 370 miles of streets in Los Angeles (about four percent of LA's total roadways) were dirty enough to warrant immediate action. An additional 42 percent of LA's roads were found to need some sort of clean up.
Streets in South, Central, and East LA accounted for more than half of LA's dirtiest streets. Wilmington was the neighborhood found to have the most miles of dirty streets in LA, with 17 miles of roads in need of cleaning. Rounding out the top four neighborhoods with the most dirty streets were Downtown LA (15 miles), Sun Valley (14 miles), and Venice (8 miles).
Low-income neighborhoods will most likely be top priority when the city goes about its cleaning. Poorer areas of town have traditionally been most affected by dirty streets, experiencing a significant delay in the cleanup of illegal dumping when compared to the response time of cleanups in more affluent neighborhoods.
Sanitation officials plan to keep on top of the ever-changing street cleaning situation, holding regular meetings to discuss strategy and priority. Street information in the CleanStat database system will be updated every three months with GPS data and dashcam footage.
To see how LA neighborhoods fared or find the cleanliness grade for a specific street, use the the interactive map below.
Blight of street trash worst in L.A.'s poorer neighborhoods, new database shows [LA Times]
Where are L.A.'s dirtiest streets? [LA Times]
New Map Has the Details on All Los Angeles Street Construction [Curbed LA]
Los Angeles Just Isn't Picking Up Trash in Poor Neighborhoods [Curbed LA]
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