Meet the new Rotterdam rapid response anti-litter team

It will also respond to alarms from citizens in real-time

Yesterday, authorities in the Dutch city of Rotterdam unveiled its new fleet of electric litter-cleaning vehicles. According to an official statement, the fleet of so-called Stint Cargos will be on the roads looking for trash and responding to reports in real time.

The city has acquired three new green electric machines that function similarly to electric scooters, operators will have to ride upright. However, they have four wheels and are much more stable, with a large compartment for trash collection.

Reportedly, Rotterdam will be one of the first cities in the Netherlands to use such a rapid reaction system to clean up the city. At the same time, the high mobility of the electric cleaners will allow work teams to reach very hard and off-the-beaten-track places to combat littering even in more remote areas.

Resolving urgent litter situations

The new rapid response team will drive around the city and collect garbage wherever they find it. Furthermore, local authorities say that the Stint Cargos force will have five teams of cleaner drivers that should reach into far-away residential areas, jumping quickly from location to location, in both busy and quiet parts of the city.

Authorities have dubbed them ‘super-fast clean teams’ as they can use cycling lanes to circumvent traffic and immediately respond to notifications from Rotterdam residents. They would receive said notifications through the MeldR app.

Alternatively, Rotterdamers can also contact the city over the phone (dialling 14010), where calls will be immediately forwarded to street cleaning teams and shortening response times.   

The key point with the new cleaning crew is speed and according to Alderman Vincent Karremans, quoted in a press statement, the city will become cleaner faster.

The Alderman referred to the broken windows theory by explaining that citizens would be less likely to litter if streets are cleaner in general. Thus, he pointed to the speed of cleaning teams as a crucial feature to prevent the accumulation of trash.