It's simple: no one. Americans can enjoy 4 (or more) years of nasty, unusable toilets, and will probably just take a dump behind a tree if they're in a national park, so popular parks will be full of human waste lying around. Maybe they can just close the parks altogether.
National parks are run by the National Park Service (an agency within the Dept of the Interior) not by the United States Forest Service (an agency within the Dept of Agriculture).
This article is about the very remote, primitive campgrounds in national forests. I've camped in them, and in my experience the toilets are already nasty.
No, don't close the park. Just open them for business. You want a clean, well-light, comfortable toilet in a national park? NP Toilet Inc will provide one for a small fee.
People will get mad about having to pay a "small" fee to use a toilet at a national park, so some will take a crap behind a tree.
So the USFS and NPS could then hire private security companies to patrol the parks looking for people peeing and pooping behind trees, and arrest them, forcing them to pay huge fees to be released.
Maybe this could be a model for law enforcement all over America, actually: privatize all the police. People could just pay fines for whatever crime they've committed: $1000 for insulting the president, $10,000 for shoplifting, $10M for murder, etc.
Also, you want to walk around on trails? National Trails Nature Inc. will provide you the experience for a small hourly fee, free to roam as deeply as your pockets go!
Ah it’s the classic rule. If you’re the government you have to hire a guy who has A, B, and C but if you hire a non-profit that non-profit can hire a guy who has none of that and so can do it cheaper. Cool!
There's something seriously wrong with government when this sentence is true:
"The BTNF essentially hired Kosiba’s group, which could then contract out with other private companies. They agreed to do the job at about a third of that $120,000."
That's really not normal. What's going on in government spending?
Corruption. It’s interesting how it happens across all human activity. There are mechanisms to reduce it, such as strict penalties (Singapore) or moving to a competitive for-profit model (USFS does rent out many park areas).
They still would because the holes typically are very shallow, and half filled with toilet paper. The next significant rainfall that comes around, there's soiled paper all strewn about the mud.
A sharp enough fold-up shovel becomes necessary kit when dealing with compacted dry soil.
> I think it should be taught in schools.
If a solution involves 'If everyone would just X', it's very unlikely that actually 'everyone would just X', at least not without significant incentive. Education definitely has a role to play in making 'more people just X' by changing peoples' value judgements.
I do have a significant incentive to not leave my shit lying around, as I also want to go the forest in the future. Most people do.
Only some don't give a shit at all - the main problem here is simply not knowing how to behave if in the forest, if it never was shown to you. A proper toilet is the standard and expected. And when there is no toilet? Too embarrassing to even talk about .. so quick behind a bush, quick a piece of paper, has no one seen it? Now quick away and pretend it didn't happen. That is the usual modus operandi of civilized people feeling a natural desire in the woords. Simply getting a lesson in school would normalize it.
In the high use areas camp toilets are found, this won't work. Rain will expose poop and TP, animals will be attracted and dig it up, and soon you'll try to dig in a "secluded" spot and stick your shovel into someone else's cat hole.
If camp toilets aren't an option the only real alternative in those areas will be to bring a wag bag or poop tube and pack it out.
Start charging commercial USDA users market fees set by auction instead of below market fees. A lot of surplus is going straight to commercial users of American land.
The current fee for grazing, for example, is $1.35 monthly per head, up from $1.23... in 1966. Time for these rural users to start paying their fair share!
/s
I'm mostly kidding, but articles like this pretending that the major costs of running the USFS and other public lands are on rec. users instead of commercial drive me nuts. These public lands are used for commercial extractive purposes at a loss all. the. time. Why is federal spending on public lands so far down, while more americans than ever (proportional and absolute) are using these resources for recreation?
The sarcasm is for the crabs in a bucket mentality, and the idea that everything has to be about profits. It’s ok for government services to lose money.
Just fund it properly at the legislative level, and then decide if subsidized services are appropriate. The US government has enough money that running a bunch of pit toilets in the woods shouldn’t be a challenge.
This article is about the very remote, primitive campgrounds in national forests. I've camped in them, and in my experience the toilets are already nasty.
So the USFS and NPS could then hire private security companies to patrol the parks looking for people peeing and pooping behind trees, and arrest them, forcing them to pay huge fees to be released.
Maybe this could be a model for law enforcement all over America, actually: privatize all the police. People could just pay fines for whatever crime they've committed: $1000 for insulting the president, $10,000 for shoplifting, $10M for murder, etc.
this is exactly what you're supposed to do. even park rangers will tell you that.
Peeing behind a tree is fine, but that's a different matter.
"The BTNF essentially hired Kosiba’s group, which could then contract out with other private companies. They agreed to do the job at about a third of that $120,000."
That's really not normal. What's going on in government spending?
Another ‘right way’ is to use a portable bidet, or a spray bottle. Not for everyone
A sharp enough fold-up shovel becomes necessary kit when dealing with compacted dry soil.
> I think it should be taught in schools.
If a solution involves 'If everyone would just X', it's very unlikely that actually 'everyone would just X', at least not without significant incentive. Education definitely has a role to play in making 'more people just X' by changing peoples' value judgements.
I do have a significant incentive to not leave my shit lying around, as I also want to go the forest in the future. Most people do.
Only some don't give a shit at all - the main problem here is simply not knowing how to behave if in the forest, if it never was shown to you. A proper toilet is the standard and expected. And when there is no toilet? Too embarrassing to even talk about .. so quick behind a bush, quick a piece of paper, has no one seen it? Now quick away and pretend it didn't happen. That is the usual modus operandi of civilized people feeling a natural desire in the woords. Simply getting a lesson in school would normalize it.
If camp toilets aren't an option the only real alternative in those areas will be to bring a wag bag or poop tube and pack it out.
The current fee for grazing, for example, is $1.35 monthly per head, up from $1.23... in 1966. Time for these rural users to start paying their fair share!
/s
I'm mostly kidding, but articles like this pretending that the major costs of running the USFS and other public lands are on rec. users instead of commercial drive me nuts. These public lands are used for commercial extractive purposes at a loss all. the. time. Why is federal spending on public lands so far down, while more americans than ever (proportional and absolute) are using these resources for recreation?
Just fund it properly at the legislative level, and then decide if subsidized services are appropriate. The US government has enough money that running a bunch of pit toilets in the woods shouldn’t be a challenge.