Not every part of Kasarani looks like an estate with clear roads and defined compounds. Pockets of denser, more informally built housing within our service area present a genuinely different set of logistical challenges for collection, ones our standard truck-and-route model wasn't originally designed around, and adapting to them has been an ongoing process rather than a solved problem.

Why standard routes don't work everywhere

Our collection truck needs a road wide enough to pass, and a stopping point close enough to a cluster of households that carrying waste to it remains practical. In denser, more informally developed pockets, narrow footpaths between structures, uneven or unpaved ground, and housing built without the same spacing as planned estates all make a standard truck-and-stop model difficult or impossible to apply directly.

How we've adapted collection for these areas

Where a truck genuinely can't reach, we've relied on smaller-scale, manual collection — collectors on foot, using pushcarts or sacks rather than a vehicle, moving waste from individual households to a nearby point the truck can access. This adds time and physical effort to the collection process considerably, and it's part of why some of the denser pockets within our service villages take longer per household served than a straightforward estate route would.

The segregation challenge unique to these areas

Segregation itself doesn't change in principle in denser housing — the same three-stream, organic-recyclable-general system applies. What changes is the practical space available for it. Households in very compact housing sometimes lack room for three separate containers the way a household with more compound space does, which has meant adapting our guidance to smaller, stackable options rather than the larger buckets or crates we typically recommend elsewhere.

Why we haven't simply skipped these areas

It would be operationally simpler to focus exclusively on areas our standard route model serves easily and treat denser, harder-to-reach pockets as a lower priority. We've deliberately resisted that, because these are often the areas where informal dumping risk is highest precisely because reliable collection has historically been hardest to establish — skipping them would mean concentrating our efforts where the underlying problem is already smaller, rather than where it's often most acute.

What we've learned from the areas we do serve

The clearest lesson has been that manual, on-foot collection in these areas needs to be planned as its own distinct activity with appropriately allocated time and staffing, not squeezed in as an afterthought to a truck-based route. Collectors assigned to these pockets need more time per household than our standard route planning assumes, and treating that honestly in scheduling, rather than expecting the same pace as an estate route, has made service in these areas considerably more reliable than our earlier attempts.

What this means for future expansion

As we consider new areas for route expansion, housing density and accessibility are now factored explicitly into our assessment, alongside the demand-driven criteria — resident interest, committee support — we've always used. An area with strong demonstrated interest but genuinely difficult physical access may still be served, but with a realistic plan for manual collection built in from the start, rather than assuming a standard route model will simply work once residents are on board.

What residents in denser housing can do to help

  • Identify, with neighbours, a shared, truck-accessible point where manually collected waste can be consolidated for pickup.
  • Use smaller, stackable segregation containers suited to more compact housing where space is limited.
  • Let us know directly if physical access is a barrier to consistent collection in your specific area, since this shapes how we plan staffing and routes.

Why patience with this work has mattered as much as any specific technique

Perhaps more than any other part of our operation, service in denser, harder-to-access housing has required accepting a slower pace of improvement than we might prefer. Progress here has come through incremental adjustments — a slightly better consolidation point identified, a collector's manual route refined after months of practice — rather than a single decisive fix, and we've had to resist the temptation to treat slow, steady improvement as a sign the underlying approach isn't working.

Frequently asked questions

Does segregation work differently in denser, informal housing?

The same three-stream system applies, though we recommend smaller, stackable containers where space is limited rather than the larger bins used elsewhere.

Why does collection sometimes take longer in these areas?

Manual, on-foot collection where a truck can't reach directly requires more time and effort per household than standard route collection, which we now plan for explicitly in staffing.

Can an area with difficult physical access still be added to your route?

Yes, though it typically requires a specific manual-collection plan rather than assuming a standard truck route will work; reach out to discuss your specific area.

See how we've grown our overall route over time in our piece on door-to-door collection across six villages.