Anchorage Daily News

WASILLA - Talkeetna hopes to flush an odiferous outhouse from a downtown park even as increasing numbers of tourists run up against limited places to answer the call of nature.Talkeetna's community council agreed last week to recommend removing and replacing the shabby two-hole, metal-seated pit toilet in Village Park on Main Street because of problems with trash and a rank stench.

The brown double outhouse - one painted blue inside, the other pink - has been around for more than a decade.

"I went in there once, and I didn't go in there again," council member Jok Bondurant said. "Can you imagine in Wasilla if they had a pit toilet that stunk to high heaven - what would that say to someone that's visiting?"

Ralph Naffziger, the Matanuska-Susitna Borough's north region parks and recreation representative, recommended the council oust the outhouse, which is maintained by the borough.

Naffziger said that in June, a septic company couldn't pump the toilet out. Partiers had crammed the pits too full of beer cans and other trash, the septic truck driver told him.

Toilets are of concern in Talkeetna because of the deluge of visitors the town attracts.

Every summer, hordes of tourists descend on the small town, which is a jumping off point to Mount McKinley and pit stop for many on their way to Denali National Park.

Some are independent travelers but most are ferried there by Princess buses, by train, or by other big tourism ventures. While those travelers bring dollars, they also bring their need for facilities, which are limited in town.

Some use the relatively fancy borough-built flush toilets at the entry to the park along the Talkeetna River, though lines get long, several locals said. Those restrooms also close after the summer, so locals such as people living up the tracks in Chase can't use them.

Others head for Tanner's Trading Post, or the Don Sheldon Hangar, where there's a public restroom.

But lines at the hangar get long too.

"Sometimes when I'm going to get my mail, that little alley down there, you can see people standing there," said wilderness guide Billy FitzGerald. "I think there's an event going on. Oh my gosh, they're all waiting to use the bathroom, and they're not used to using the bushes like some of us."

The council wants community say in designing new bathrooms, with funding help from the borough, according to unofficial minutes of their Sept. 8 meeting. They also want to tap Princess Cruises, Cook Inlet Region Inc. and the Alaska Railroad.

"Especially Princess," said Bondurant, a pilot who flies for Hudson Air. "We provide a theme park for all their visitors, thousands and thousands of visitors, for nothing. Couldn't they build us a place for all those thousands of people to go potty? That was our thinking."

Borough officials weren't available for comment. Princess spokesman Bruce Bustamante said he hadn't heard anything about the park toilets. Neither had railroad spokesman Tim Thompson.

CIRI has supported the use of bed taxes for bathrooms in the past, but is also on record telling borough Assembly officials not to build projects they can't keep up, spokesman Jim Jager said.

In other words, Jager continued, "don't spend a bunch of money to build a nice bathroom facility but keep it locked up because you can't afford to put toilet paper in it."

If the borough does replace the outhouse, Naffziger said he would "feel like I've actually done my job."

How about if the borough names any new facility after him?

"Are you kidding? Do you want your name on an outhouse?" he asked. "But thanks for the thought."

Find Zaz Hollander online at adn.com/contact/zhollander or call 352-6711.

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