This is because these machines are very efficient tools for cleaning up leaves and other small debris from landscape sites. Since their development in the 1970s, leaf blowers to a large extent have supplanted brooms, hoses, and rakes. Leaf blowers save enormous amounts of time. Most landscape industry estimates suggest that it takes at least five times as long to clean a typical landscape site with a broom and rake than it does with a power leaf blower. The bottom line is that without leaf blowers, public agencies and private owners would have to spend more time on outdoor work or accept a lower level of upkeep.
Time is money.
CLCA members servicing landscape maintenance accounts estimate that their costs would increase an average of 20.7 percent if they had to perform the same functions without the leaf blower. This estimate comes from a survey that CLCA sent its members in late 1998. CLCA believes many clients can't afford or are not willing to pay for the additional costs of performing landscape maintenance without the leaf blower. This information also comes from CLCA s 1998 membership survey. The last option is a possibility because leaf blower bans have been difficult to enforce in municipalities that have passed an ordinance to date.