---
title: "Dartford Borough Council adds four Schmidt sweepers to street cleansing fleet in Dartford, Kent; Eight-year leases align with new contract"
sdDatePublished: "2026-08-18T10:07:00Z"
source: "https://www.aebi-schmidt.com/en/news/2026/08/18/dartford-borough-council-adds-four-new-schmidt-sweepers-to-street-cleansing-fleet/"
topics:
  - name: "waste management"
    identifier: "medtop:20000269"
  - name: "local authority"
    identifier: "medtop:20000612"
  - name: "public contract"
    identifier: "medtop:20001159"
  - name: "road transport"
    identifier: "medtop:20000341"
locations:
  - "Doncaster"
  - "Kent"
---


Dartford Borough Council adds four Schmidt sweepers to street cleansing fleet in Dartford, Kent; Eight-year leases align with new contract

Dartford Borough Council adds four new Schmidt sweepers to street cleansing fleet | Aebi Schmidt Group

Dartford Borough Council adds four new Schmidt sweepers to street cleansing fleet

Dartford Borough Council in north-west of the county of Kent, has added four new sweepers from Aebi Schmidt UK to its street cleansing fleet to keep the pavements, paths and roadways throughout the borough clean and litter-free.

The new sweepers – a Swingo 200 + , a Cleango 500, a CityJet 3030 HW and a Street King 660 – were all specified by waste management specialists, Doncaster-based FCC Environment (FCC), which holds the council’s current street cleansing contract.

As part of an existing business relationship between the two suppliers, the sweepers were outright purchased by Fiveways Municipal Vehicle Hire Ltd and leased back to FCC with full gold standard maintenance contracts for up to eight years and 40 hours a week per machine.

Extensive range wins the day

Ian Corry, FCC Environment Contract Manager at Dartford, said the contract for the sweepers had been awarded to Aebi Schmidt because of the depth and quality of their range.

“I brought in four manufacturers with demonstrators to evaluate the most suitable for our contractual needs. While each one had its merits, the one that really stood out and that had the full range of sweepers that I required was Aebi Schmidt,” he said.

FCC has been the incumbent at Dartford BC for the last seven years and has recently been awarded a new eight year contract to continue delivering the Council’s street cleansing and waste collection services, following a competitive procurement process based on an evaluation of both quality and financial criteria.

“We have specified eight-year leases for the machines to coincide with the new contract. Our driver operators rate their new equipment very highly, especially their ease of use. Any minor teething issues we may have had have been quickly rectified by Schmidt engineers who have provided a fantastic, same-day level of support,” added Ian Corry.

While the Swingo, Cleango and Street King 660 will have general road and pathway cleansing duties throughout the Borough for eight hours a day, five days a week, the CityJet has been acquired for a very specific purpose.

“The council has made a multi-million-pound investment in the town centre including new granite pavement surfaces and we wanted a machine specifically to look after the cleaning of these areas. The CityJet fits the bill perfectly,” said Ian Corry.

The four sweepers were all specified with the Aebi Schmidt IntelliOps platform which allows the sweepers to be tracked on a customiseable map to evaluate and improve performance.

Emma Cheesman, Head of Development at Fiveways Municipal Vehicle Hire Ltd said:“The use of the IntelliOPS platform is a real benefit for our Service allowing us to remotely monitor vehicle health, access fault diagnostics and identify potential issues before they result in downtime. This enables a proactive maintenance approach, improves first-time fix rates and maximises vehicle availability.“

Emma also praised the level of training that driver operators had received from Aebi Schmidt trainers.

“Aebi Schmidt provided a full day’s training for two operators for each machine which has proved very valuable in familiarising them with the equipment. And we have also had tremendous support and help from Paul Pudney, our account manager,“ she said.

Aebi Schmidt Area Sales Manager, Paul Pudney, commented: “We are delighted to have played a key role in helping fulfil the street cleansing contract at Dartford Borough Council and look forward to working with them for the next eight years and beyond.”