Serving Campbell River and north Vancouver Island
Septic Systems on Quadra Island, Electoral Area C
Campbell River Septic installs, designs and inspects septic systems on Quadra Island, which sits in Electoral Area C of the Strathcona Regional District. We come over on the ferry from Campbell River. We file your plans with Island Health before we build, and we submit the signed letter of certification within 30 days of finishing.
A Quadra Island site and soil assessment runs $1,200 to $2,500. A system design runs $1,500 to $3,500.
No building permit here — but the septic filing still applies
Electoral Areas A, B and C have no building bylaws and require no building permits. Area D does.
Quadra Island is in Electoral Area C, so the Strathcona Regional District does not require a building permit for new construction here. Your septic filing is a separate thing entirely. It is provincial, it runs through Island Health, and it applies on Quadra Island exactly as it does inside the city.
Building new on an island lot
The Sewerage System Regulation covers systems under 22,700 litres per day, so a professional may design up to 22,699. A ROWP covers Type 1 and Type 2 under 9,100.
We start with a site and soil assessment, then design a system sized to your daily flow. Most island houses land well inside what a ROWP is registered to design and install. We file the plans, the specifications and the site plan with Island Health before anything goes in the ground.
Where a system will not fit at all
Where no system can be installed on a parcel, the owner may install a sewage holding tank.
Some island parcels will not take a system. If the assessment says yours is one of them, a sewage holding tank is the option the regulation leaves you. The assessment is where that answer comes out, before any design work starts.
What ends up in the ground
Type 2 effluent has to come in under 45 mg/L suspended solids and under 45 mg/L five-day biochemical oxygen demand.
Most island builds land on one of two shapes. A Type 1 system settles what leaves the house in a septic tank and disperses it through a dispersal field, using gravity distribution where the ground allows it. A Type 2 system puts a treatment unit ahead of the field and has to hit a defined effluent standard.
Either way you get the same fittings on the tank: a tank lid you can actually reach, a riser where it needs one, and an effluent filter keeping solids out of the field. Where the layout needs it, an effluent pump moves the flow under pressure distribution, controlled by a float switch.
Getting a crew and a machine across
The ferry sets which day we come over, and we bring everything for the job in one trip.
Working here means the ferry is part of the job. We plan an island day around it, which mostly means bringing what we need in one trip rather than driving back for a fitting.
That is a practical difference, not a regulatory one. Your system is designed and filed to exactly the same standard as one on the highway side of the water, and the letter of certification that lets you use it works the same way.
Nearby service areas
Campbell River sits across the passage, and Campbellton is at the north end of the city.
We also cover the far side of the passage, and Campbellton at its north end.
Septic work on Quadra Island, in practice
Where a gravity field will not fit the setbacks, we design a pressure-dosed system instead.
What does a job like this look like?
The situation
Somebody has bought an island parcel and wants a house on it. The lot is steep at one end and tight at the other.
What makes it harder
The test pits come back saying a conventional gravity field will not disperse the flow anywhere the setbacks allow us to put one.
What we do
We design a pressure-dosed system instead and site the field in the one workable corner. Where a parcel takes no system at all, a holding tank is what the regulation leaves you, and we say that early.
Questions from island owners
No building permit here — so no septic paperwork either?
No, and this is the one that catches people. The building permit rule is local and it does not apply in this electoral area. The Island Health filing is provincial and it applies here exactly as it does inside the city.
Should I get the assessment before I buy?
If you can, yes. What the soil does changes the system, and the system is one of the bigger numbers in a build budget. We can dig the test pits and log the soil before you close, so you know what the lot will take.
What if the parcel will not take a system?
Then the option the regulation leaves you is a holding tank. It is not the answer anybody hopes for, and it is one of the things we install.
Can I do the work myself out here?
You may build your own system, but an Authorized Person still has to design it, file the documents and supervise the construction. Repairs and maintenance are the same: an Authorized Person, or somebody working under one's supervision.
Tell us about your Quadra Island lot and we'll come over and price the job for you.
Septic services here
- Septic System InstallationNew Type 1 and Type 2 systems, designed and installed with the Island Health filing handled.
- Septic InspectionsPerformance reports for a sale and compliance reports for a building permit application.
- Site and Soil Assessment and System DesignSoil logs, a system design sized to your daily flow, and the Island Health filing that goes with it.
Nearby service areas
Ready for a quote on septic on Quadra Island?
We quote for free, and we reply within 24 hours.