Abstract
Solid waste management plays a critical role in urban development. Transportation of
solid waste from point of generation to point of disposal is required to be done in a
minimal time to avoid accumulation of solid waste at points of generation. Uncollected
solid waste poses environmental and health hazards to residents. Therefore, it is
important to ensure that solid waste generated in an area is collected and disposed safely.
To achieve this, there should be designated solid waste collection points to control
haphazard and illegal dumping of solid waste. A pre-determined route for disposal should
also be known to ensure that all the collection points are visited, and also to minimize
time wastage during disposal. GIS provide tools for collection, storage, manipulation and
analysis of spatial data. These capabilities can be used for management and planning of
solid waste transportation. In this study, GIS have been used to determine proposed solid
waste collection points and the optimal route for disposal in Thika municipality. This was
done by solving the location allocation problem and the travelling salesman problem using
network analysis. Proposed solid waste collection points serving 67% of the population in
Thika municipality were determined. This is an improvement over the existing collection
points that serve only 33% of the population. In addition, the proposed solid waste
collection points provide better spatial coverage since they serve all the sub-locations in
the municipality in comparison to the existing points which cover three out of four sub-
locations in the municipality.
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