Pittsburgh's new public works trucks arrive and some begin hitting the streets

For the last several years, the City of Pittsburgh public works trucks have had issues staying on the road. As they age, they continue to have maintenance troubles. 

After donations to the city earlier this year, some of the new trucks are finally here.

Earlier this year, PNC donated $2 million to help the city get 15 trucks for public works.

They are now starting to arrive and get out on the streets. The trucks are a mix of pickup trucks and the bigger dump trucks.

"That's a good sign for people that want to make future donations. Look, we're going to be accountable for where this money goes," Mayor Corey O'Connor said.

In all, the city hopes to have 50 plows out on the roads. Mayor O'Connor said new drivers have been out driving in the new trucks and getting ready to tackle some of the tricky neighborhoods when winter arrives.

"The more we can do training and really emphasize that makes the driver comfortable with the new vehicle and comfortable driving up and down our streets," Mayor O'Connor said.

According to the mayor, while there are new trucks coming, there will still be some older trucks that could be more prone to breaking down in the fleet. This stresses the importance of investing in the fleet to prevent trucks from routinely breaking down.

"We have to get back to core services and everything else we want to support. We just have to go out and get partners to bridge those gaps," Mayor O'Connor said.

He was not sure how many of the trucks are here right now, but said all of them should get here by the end of October or early November.