Waste Management - Blue Barrel Disposal services the City of Santa Clarita with a fleet of roughly 50-60 trucks. For the longest time, they received some of the oldest trucks in Southern California, mainly Amreps and McNeilus, but recently, started receiving more and more brand new "Think Green, Think Clean" Amreps over the past three years. Here are 8 trucks that I've found from multiple trips to Santa Clarita.
(0:00) - 102479: I first found this truck a few years ago and always thought it was a strange unit. High unit number, odd sounding truck, and the LA paint bleeding through in multiple places make me think this is a former LABOS unit, however, no one has been able to confirm if that's the case. Based on its assignment history with WM, this is a 2002 unit, but didn't come into WM's possession until 2005. Anyway, Kevin and I decided to pass through Santa Clarita on the way to Palmdale today and this was our top priority. We both wanted to see how it was running nowadays, and it was pretty neat. Looks real good still and Francisco was really nice and is a 20 year employee of Blue Barrel. He didn't operate it too fast unfortunately but still flipped some lids and revved a little. Unfortunately some of the parts of the truck that had LA paint bleeding through it were repainted over, but there's still a few places where you can see it. Must've had some work done to it recently because it has Amrep mud flaps now as well.
(3:22) - 101508: We were looking around for a fast AFE before leaving town and stumbled upon this truck in a cul-de-sac. From where we were, we could only see the body of the truck, but no numbering anywhere on it left us curious as to who was driving. When I saw the cart fly up and down the arm, I immediately knew who was driving. Meet one of Blue Barrel's newest drivers - Allen. He's been here almost a year and is the fastest Amrep driver I've seen. I first met Allen a few months ago and was very impressed with how he drives the Mack LE Amreps. Today was no different - and the truck he was driving today sounded reallllly nice, especially with how he revved. 101508 is another neat truck to Blue Barrel - it originated at Fresno Hauling but came to Blue Barrel a few years ago along with two other units.
(8:38) - 102168: Found this unit a few months ago in February with Mondragon behind the wheel. He was lid flipping but stopped when I started filming so only got a clip. I love these AFEs - Baldwin Park had three (all of which ended up at Blue Barrel) and I got to sit in one years ago, so they're special trucks to me.
(9:20) - 102271: Another interesting truck at Blue Barrel, but this one doesn't really need much explanation due to how much it's been filmed by other users. Good ol' Luis Flores behind the wheel, one of the nicest guys out there. As some of you may have seen, GI repainted this truck back in December and I got to see it practically fresh out of the paint booth. Sweet looking rig.
(11:48) - 101334: This is what Allen was driving the first time I met him. I was about to call it quits for the day when I saw this truck fly down the street. Based on Marcus's other videos, I thought one of the slower guys used this truck regularly but when I saw the arm cycle, I wanted to investigate for a little. Sure sounded awesome and I was glad to film this truck when I did - Allen told me today that it is no longer at Blue Barrel and might have been scrapped. Little history on this truck - this is the same Mack LE Amrep that Blue Barrel ran for many years in the old blue colors (most of you have probably seen video on consolidateddisposal's channel or pics on Navymailman's Flickr). Obviously spent some time at GI then went back to Blue Barrel about a year ago. Was a bit sad that it left GI but after seeing how Allen operated it, I think it's pretty cool. All I could get before he finished. So now that you've seen Allen in this truck and 101508 (assuming you didn't skip around), I'd love to know which you enjoy more!
(15:24) - 101717: Here's a couple clips of Armando from when I filmed him in an old Irvine Volvo WXLL Amrep. This was around the time they just got them so I was really hoping to catch one and luckily got just what I was looking for that day.
(16:45) - 101578: Can't have a Blue Barrel compilation without their most famous driver in his regular truck! Old San Gabriel truck that used to do my recycling.
(17:26) - 102179: Antonio collecting the recycling in an old LA Metro AFE.
Thanks to all the awesome drivers for letting me film! Another big thanks to my buddy Damien for route info and lastly, Kevin for making a trip out here with me to catch a few old Macks.
Enjoy! Comments are always appreciated. This one's for you Marcus!