What Happened?
Springfield, Illinois, has signed a $370,000 contract to renovate a wall factory into a joint maintenance facility for city fleet vehicles from various public departments. The city expects the consolidated vehicle maintenance garage to generate $1.3 million in savings through increased efficiency and reduced waste or redundancy.
The Goal
The conversion to the joint maintenance facility is predicted to take 90 days once construction begins in January. The garage will be used by police, fire, public works and city light, water and power departments for vehicle repairs and upkeep. The contract calls for the 28,000-square-foot wall factory to be upgraded with a new drainage system, electrical and exhaust systems and a sprinkler network throughout.
The city made the decision to implementing the consolidated maintenance garage after CST Fleet Services shared a 2012 study on separate garages for public departments that illustrated how wasteful the practice is. The study revealed:
- Separate fleet operations resulted in redundant services across multiple departments
- Inaccurate record keeping on maintenance and fuel costs created city liabilities
- The city was operating with too large a fleet that wasted money and resources
- Inconsistent fleet maintenance and fuel management processes also increased costs across departments
As a result, CST Fleet Services outlined six recommendations to improve efficiency and save money:
- Launch a Fleet Management Division for centralized vehicle asset management
- Establish service level agreements between the Fleet Management Division and each department dictating asset assignments, operational missions and usage
- Implement an asset management system with maintenance and fuel management components
- Downsize the city’s fleet to appropriate numbers based on demands
- Consolidate all maintenance activities to a single facility
- Restructure fuel management processes for increased efficiency
Because Springfield had no record of the total cost of its fleet, CST Fleet Services estimated the annual expenses at $8.1 million. With the recommended changes, however, CST Fleet Services predicts annual costs to be lowered to $5.1 million after just one year of operation.
Software Upgrade
Along with the consolidated vehicle maintenance garage, Springfield is also upgrading its fleet management technology with a new web-based solution. The fleet management software will aid in tracking how much time mechanics spend on repairs, as well as monitoring fueling, mileage and maintenance schedules for the city’s 1,200 vehicles.
The technology will replace four different software systems being used by each department’s garage, as well as mechanics taking notes on paper to record hours worked on projects. Allowing mechanics to track their work on workstation laptops will increase accuracy in record keeping as well as aid in monitoring productivity to ensure time and resources are optimized.
Elsewhere in Illinois, CST Fleet Services has been called upon to evaluate and assess the operations and maintenance of fleets owned by Cook County. Just as Springfield called for a fleet study, Cook County would like CST Fleet Services to evaluate operations, assess needs and make recommendations for ways to improve maintenance and operational efficiency for reduced costs. CST Fleet Services will analyze fleet utilization and efficiency, model fleet management organization, carbon footprint baselines and best acquisition practices.
Downsize For Big Savings
Gov1 has kept an eye on consolidation projects that go beyond municipal fleets into other departments such as libraries and fire departments.