Park toils not to be a toilet

Few raise stink when asked to pack out what once was left behind

Berny Morson, Rocky Mountain News

Monday, September 24, 2007

Visitors to the most popular places in Rocky Mountain National Park are being asked to turn over a new leaf instead of another rock.

"If you moved a rock, you found someone had already made a deposit prior to you," said Jim Dougan, the park's wilderness coordinator.

And sometimes unsightly wisps of toilet paper were sticking out from under a rock, Dougan said.

So last June, the park began distributing bags to people at the popular Lumpy Ridge trailhead. Visitors are asked to pack out the stuff they used to leave under rocks.

In August, rangers began giving out bags along with camping permits on certain parts of Long's Peak, another popular destination.

"We have not had anyone say, 'That's disgusting,' " Dougan said of the reaction from people who are asked to carry human waste in their backpacks, along with their food and clothing.

The program is voluntary. Rangers don't ask whether visitors who take the bags use them, Dougan said.

However, the bags distributed at Long's Peak are inscribed with the camper's name. That way, rangers can track down campers who use the bag but leave it behind, perhaps under a rock.

The bags are manufactured by Escondido, Calif.-based Restop.

An inner sack is made of a foil-like substance. It contains a chemical that neutralizes the waste. That bag seals and is folded inside a plastic outer bag.

The kit, the size of a kitchen garbage bag, comes with toilet paper.

"You unroll the inner bag, which is sewn inside, and just kind of make a basin on the ground and squat over it, and when you're done you can put the toilet paper right in that bag, and there are tabs so you can pick up the bag, so there is no real handling of the waste," said Lara Usinowicz, of Evergreen, Restop's sales representative.

"When people say, 'Oh, that's gross,' I say, 'Well, would you go to the bathroom in your backyard and just leave it there?' " Usinowicz said.

Greg Sievers of Estes Park said he's squeamish about putting a bag of waste in his backpack - and he's the guy who suggested the Park Service start distributing the bags.

Sievers is the immediate past chairman of the Central Rockies Section of the American Alpine Club, a century- old climbing group.

Sievers, who has climbed in the park for more than 25 years, said he started thinking about how many more people must be leaving a something unpleasant behind as park visits multiply.

The Alpine Club bought the first 200 bags from Usinowicz, and Sievers built the wooden box at the Lumpy Ridge trailhead where the bags are available.

Sievers said his wife teased him about his reluctance to transport his own waste.

"I said, 'Yeah, but I can learn,'" Sievers said.

He carries a bag, but so far hasn't had to use it.

Dougan, the wilderness coordinator, said no disease outbreaks have been traced to unsanitary conditions at the park. The Park Service is trying to be proactive.

The park doesn't count visits to Lumpy Ridge, a spot popular with climbers. But they number in the thousands, and climbers congregate at the bases of the popular climbing spots and do their business, Dougan said.

Visits to Long's Peak exceed 10,000. So far this year, 450 people have camped at four Long's Peak sites that are jumping off points for early morning assaults on the summit and where the bags are being distributed.

The Park Service gets the bags for $1.50 from Restop, about half the price at camping stores.

More than 300 have been distributed at Lumpy Ridge; another 60 have gone to the Long's Peak Campers.

Dougan says he has no way of knowing if they are being used.

Renny Jackson, a Ranger at Grand Teton National Park, is sold on the program. Grand Teton has been distributing bags for more than five years at two areas that draw large numbers of visitors.

He estimates that people are carrying out eight tons of waste a year from the lower saddle at the head of Garnet Canyon.

That's how much the Park Service used to fly out by helicopter from outhouses there, Jackson said.

"Now people are carrying that down," Jackson said. "We don't see poop under rocks or toilet paper."

morsonb@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5209