Locks on Portapotties

rodiponer · Post by **rodiponer** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 9:25 am

Several of the portapotties in the bank near us were locked with combination locks. Is there an explanation for this other than some douchebags wanted their 'own' portapotty? I was kind of surprised that no one cut the locks during the entire week. I think I will bring bolt cutters next year just for this..

Artemis · Post by **Artemis** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 9:28 am

I noticed this happening as the week went on. From my anecdotal evidence, it looked to be that the portapotty cleaners were doing that as people were dumping stupid stuff into them. For example, one day I saw a loaf of bread in its plastic bag in the portapotty. The next day that one had a lock on it. I think that it was easier to lock them that way then to mistakenly try and suck it out and clog the equipment.

Playaface · Post by **Playaface** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 9:54 am

They also had locks for the disabled burners so they had their own potty. That is understandable.

Pink Daddy · Post by **Pink Daddy** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 9:57 am

I've seen camps that have private portos, just for their camp. To prevent the wandering Burner from using it, they put a lock on it. I discovered this when I visited a friend's camp and noticed that they had a porto in the camp. When I went to go use it, it was locked. I asked someone in camp about it and they opened it for me.

I've also seen certain portos locked before the event opens. I arrived six days before the gates opened last year and the porto row near our camp was mostly secured, except for a few. I realized the reasoning behind this was to prevent the pump trucks from having to make so many stops, just because some drunk guy decided to test every porto in the row and being the only person using them.

spectabillis · Post by **spectabillis** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 10:13 am

i think its r-dobbs that used to do excellent coverage of the toilets and informing people, but not sure.

our camp did the private toilet thing, helps keep the burdon off the public ones. locked it more because random people would tend to abuse it like the public ones, so thats really the only practical choice without posting some sort of toilet nazi to enforce its proper use. sad, but true.

artemis is right, sometimes people dispose things that make it unusable until someone else has to come and clean it out. r-dobbs (or whoever it was) used to take note of the strangest things people would put in them - strap-on, diapers, manequin head... i once heard of a two-way radio turned on that was being used to talk to people (never could confirm that though).

Post by **mdmf007** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 10:21 am

If it was a handicapped stall - they were all supposed to be locked. People with needs could get the code from us at the medical stations.

the combo WAS 1111

if it wasnt a handicapped stall that blows.

skygnome777 · Post by **skygnome777** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 10:42 am

One of the stalls near my camp had an electronic device playing fur Elise inside it somewhere. I didn't know where it was coming from but I heard it every time i used a stall near it!

motskyroonmatick · Post by **motskyroonmatick** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 12:41 pm

Ok folks. I work with Robbidobbs on the Potty Project. Here is some stuff that I know.

All handicap porta potties are locked so that they are not messed up and always ready to use by the people who need them.

Pre event and post event many of the porta potties are zip tied shut so that the service trucks only service to the level that the current population requires. Do NOT remove those zip ties as we found one person doing as we were putting the PSA's up on the front. The united site service guys will cut off the zip ties at the appropriate time. Do not take it upon your self to do so. The individual units may not be ready for use or may be cleaned up for removal from playa.

There were some 800+ porta potties on playa this year and early indications say it was a good year for shit. Just like last year according to Robbidobbs. Once again baby wipes in the porta potties was the biggest concern and problem for U.S.S. This year on a trial basis the service was stepped up to every 6 hours during the day and I saw one bank being serviced by 3 trucks at one point.

BTW. The wrappers for the toilet paper rolls are designed to break down so they can go in the potty instead of on the floor to get blown out as moop.

Ugly Dougly · Post by **Ugly Dougly** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 1:24 pm

Porta-potties make a great make-shift sleeping shelter if you have been kicked out of your camp.

Boijoy · Post by **Boijoy** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 1:49 pm

Thanks for the info. Mots. I didn't know the tp wrappers broke down & was annoyed to potty crew didn't remove them. I was picking the dang things up all week & throwing them away.

oneeyeddick · Post by **oneeyeddick** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 5:16 pm

I always referred to them as "first wipes".

Kenny Z · Post by **Kenny Z** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 6:41 pm

Yup, the camp across from me did that. Hell, they paid good money to bring their own private porta-potties out there. They were nice enough to let us use them a few times. It's nice to share with your neighbor camps and maybe a desperate soul in need but there is a limit. Hell, I always bring tons of Carne Asada for surrounding camps and wandering souls but you can't expect me to feed the entire playa.

kahluagal · Post by **kahluagal** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 6:47 pm

yup, locks tend to happen with private camps... not that they should bother, since the locks tend to get stolen/broken/etc. by the second day :)

I will say that the portapotties were pretty damn clean this year - most of the time I went to the big banks of them near me (8 and B ish) they looked/smelled like they had been cleaned recently, so maybe they were coming around a bit more. And as usual, burners tend to help each other out - by the end of the week I saw folks bringing their toilet paper in and just leaving it in the portapotties, which is cool :)

I wonder if they can ever make 1 ply baby wipes to help alleviate that particular problem... a girl can dream, I guess.

**burn** · Post by **burn** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 7:20 pm

The locks for Terminal Village did not break or disappear all week.

Well, until one burner dropped the lock down the potty.

Robbidobbs rocks!

One ply wipes would make a shit load of money from me.

Dave_techie · Post by **Dave_techie** » Thu Sep 10, 2009 9:24 pm

ROBBIDOBBS FTW!

I helped her post pooetry.

great experience.

brcprincess · Post by **brcprincess** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 5:18 am

On the subject, did BM management cut back on the hand sanitizer budget this year because it was hardly EVER refilled when United cleaned the loos. Last year was fine, but United barely did it this year.

Ugly Dougly · Post by **Ugly Dougly** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 10:37 am

brcprincess wrote:On the subject, did BM management cut back on the hand sanitizer budget this year because it was hardly EVER refilled when United cleaned the loos. Last year was fine, but United barely did it this year.

You should have come to 3:00 and Fossil. Everything ran sweetly.

theCryptofishist · Post by **theCryptofishist** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 10:52 am

With hand sanitizer widely available at pharmacies and supermarkets there is a back up plan.

Kinetik V · Post by **Kinetik V** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 10:59 am

The portapotties were the cleanest I've ever seen out there...and every one that I was in was always stocked for a change. Compared to previous years this was a welcome change!

LostinReno · Post by **LostinReno** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 11:24 am

Ugly Dougly wrote:
brcprincess wrote:On the subject, did BM management cut back on the hand sanitizer budget this year because it was hardly EVER refilled when United cleaned the loos. Last year was fine, but United barely did it this year.
You should have come to 3:00 and Fossil. Everything ran sweetly.

I think there was only 2 times the sanitizer was out at 7 & I, other than that they were really clean! Mr. Lost trucked the liquid end product out of BRC all week (Lovelock has got to be smelling good, cause that is where it all went!),he said everything ran very smoothly...no pun intended!

psynurse · Post by **psynurse** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 11:28 am

All of the med toilets were locked-- I heard lots of people complaining about those but it's understandable. Overall I thought the potty situation was amazing!!

DoctorIknow · Post by **DoctorIknow** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 6:51 pm

For the first time, I didn't see any foreign objects dumped, and I never saw a messy unit. My GF reminded me of '98 when we opened the door once to see the pile of crap/tissue extending like a volcano ABOVE the seat. A visual I didn't like remembering...

theCryptofishist · Post by **theCryptofishist** » Fri Sep 11, 2009 9:24 pm

psynurse wrote:All of the med toilets were locked-- I heard lots of people complaining about those but it's understandable. Overall I thought the potty situation was amazing!!

More than merely "understandable"--pretty much necessary. A lot of body functions go on there, and even if it weren't a matter of cleanliness, an absence of lines would sure be good when you have to dump the puke out of an emesis basin.

Zim · Post by **Zim** » Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:09 pm

Someone took a shit on a toilet seat while we were out there. Who the fuck would you do that shit?