The Facility Researchers staff the snow lab year-round. This site has three instrument towers from 7 to 11m tall. A small instrument tower is located 100m north of Lab in a forested site. A wide variety of mammal and bird species inhabit the forest surrounding the Lab. The Lab also has long-term data sets on wind speed and direction, solar radiation, snow temperature, relative humidity, and soil moisture.
Archives containing a wide variety of data collected over the past fifty years also exist.
The Area Donner Summit has several hundred full-time residents and supports 7 developed ski areas. In Soda Springs, there is a food market, a gas station, and a post office.