Houston Airport System
Two airports, 73 restrooms, and cleaning schedules built on flight data instead of guesswork. Houston Airport System reported $300,000 in inventory savings in six months after deploying TRAX across its terminals.
The restroom was clean. Something else was wrong.
Houston Airport System runs two airports, George Bush Intercontinental and William P. Hobby. Before TRAX, work schedules and break schedules were built without demand data behind them. The frontline team felt understaffed, because they were being asked to meet expectations the schedule made impossible.
TRAX put SmartRestroom in 73 restrooms and Clean+Inspect on an iPad mounted to every cleaning cart. What the data kept showing was that the cleaning was not the failure point. Three separate times, Houston went looking for a dirty restroom and found something else instead.
The Challenge
Houston’s work schedules and break schedules were built without demand data behind them. Nobody knew which restrooms were actually busy, so staff were sent to places that did not need them while other areas went unattended. The frontline team felt understaffed. From where they were standing they were, because the schedule was pointed at the wrong places at the wrong times. Breaks landed during peak hours for the same reason.
Then there was the feedback. Negative survey results kept arriving right after a cleaning: floors dirty, stalls dirty, poor air quality. From the outside, that reads as a cleaning failure and it lands on the frontline. Houston had no way to tell whether it actually was one.
The Solution
TRAX deployed SmartRestroom across 73 restrooms at both airports, with Clean+Inspect on an iPad mounted to every cleaning cart. The app tells staff when a restroom needs attention, shows what is assigned to them, lets them log the inventory they used, and routes them to the next work order by priority when they close one out. Houston pairs predictive flight information with real-time restroom data, so the schedule follows the arrivals rather than the clock.
In 2020 Houston added a CleanConnect proof of concept for facility-wide mapping, along with an integration into Infor, the work order management system they already ran. A work order opened in Clean+Inspect opens in Infor too. The frontline works in one app, and the system of record stays the system of record.
What TRAX deployed
- SmartRestroom across 73 restrooms at two airports
- Clean+Inspect on iPads mounted to every cleaning cart
- Predictive flight data paired with real-time restroom activity
- Throughput trend reporting by location
- CleanConnect facility-wide mapping, added as a proof of concept in 2020
- Integration with Infor work order management
The Benefits
- Reallocated staff from low-traffic restrooms to high-demand areas, meeting cleaning expectations without hiring anyone new
- Staggered breaks away from peak hours, using throughput trends instead of a fixed schedule
- Traced "floors were dirty" feedback to poor-quality paper shedding tabs on the floor after passengers dried their hands, then used the data to request a better product
- Traced "stalls dirty" and "poor air quality" to flushometers needing adjustment and a malfunctioning ventilation system, and saw feedback scores improve once both were fixed
- Work orders opened once in Clean+Inspect and visible in Infor, with no duplicate entry
Houston Airport System reported $300,000 in inventory savings in six months after deploying TRAX across its terminals. The team met its cleaning expectations without adding headcount, and stopped guessing which restroom needed attention next.
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