Vault Toilet at the Golden Quartz Picnic Site

The Golden Quartz Picnic Site is the only public day use area east of the town of Washington along the South Yuba River in the Tahoe National Forest. As with many sites along the Yuba, in the past handful of years, use of the site has quadrupled, and its aging infrastructure has been pushed to the limits. Besides the picnic tables, one of the most noticeable infrastructure features at the site was the old vault toilet installed in the mid-1970s. This facility had exceeded its service lifestyle and was on the brink of failure and leakage. It also did not meet today’s standard for accessibility.

Thanks to funding secured from Nevada Country through their Outdoor Visitor Safety Fund grant program, SYRCL and the Forest Service were able to install a new, state-of-the-art, accessible vault toilet at the picnic site, replacing the old one.

The new vault toilet was originally slated for installation before Oct. 15, 2022, but supply chain and staffing shortage issues at the manufacturer pushed the installation date to spring 2023. Additional problems with access delayed the installation even further until the fall of 2023.

The Forest Service was instrumental in site preparation and installation navigation. SYRCL was more than happy to coordinate the process, as keeping a vault toilet from leaking into the Yuba River fully aligns with our mission.

The Old Vault Toilet at Gold Quartz