Redondo Beach will spend up to $34,758 to find out how much its roads suffer from garbage trucks and street sweepers.

The City Council unanimously approved the consulting agreement on the Nov. 3, 2026, consent calendar, as first reported by Patch. None of the 18 consent calendar items were pulled for separate discussion.

The study will measure how residential and commercial waste collection vehicles contribute to pavement deterioration and calculate their share of the city's annual street maintenance costs. It will compare the road impact of garbage, recycling and organic waste trucks, along with street sweepers, against passenger cars and other commercial vehicles.

HF&H Consultants, LLC, will conduct the analysis. The firm will work with city officials and Athens Services, Redondo Beach's exclusive waste hauler, to gather data on vehicle weights, axle configurations, collection schedules and how often trucks travel city streets. That data will be combined with pavement condition assessments, traffic counts and maintenance spending to estimate the annual cost of road wear tied to waste collection and street sweeping.

The study will break results down by road type, distinguishing between residential streets, collector roads and major thoroughfares. It will also account for maintenance, rehabilitation and reconstruction costs.

The agreement does not suggest garbage trucks are causing unusually severe damage. According to council documents, the goal is to establish how much of the city's overall pavement deterioration can be attributed to those vehicles. Public Works Director Andrew Winje is listed as the city contact for the agenda item.

HF&H is scheduled to deliver a draft report by March 15, 2027, with the final report due April 15. The findings must include the calculations, methodology, assumptions and limitations of the analysis. The consultant's underlying pavement deterioration model, however, will remain proprietary and will not be publicly available.

If the city or Athens Services cannot supply all the necessary data, HF&H may use information from comparable projects or other industry sources, with assumptions reviewed by city staff. The fixed-fee agreement runs through Nov. 2, 2027, with half the payment due after the draft report and the rest after the final version.

No one discussed the item at the meeting. What the city plans to do with the findings is not addressed in the agreement or the council documents.