NYC: A Million Attractions, but Nowhere to Piss
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NYC: A Million Attractions, but Nowhere to Piss
Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
IPS - Jan 3, 2008
http://www.ipsnews.net/print.asp?idnews=40673
A Million Attractions, but Nowhere to Go
by Nergui Manalsuren
NEW YORK, Jan 3 (IPS) - When New York City banned cigarette smoking in
bars and restaurants several years ago, the sardonic television host
Jon Stewart pointed out that forcing smokers into the streets outside
would also help mask the city's ubiquitous urine smell. With 2008
designated by the United Nations as the "International Year of
Sanitation", public toilet activists are stepping up their demands for
expanded facilities in one of the richest metropolises on Earth.
According to the American Restroom Association, Singapore, with a
population of 4.5 people, has 29,500 public toilets, while New York
City, with some 8.2 million residents, has a relatively scant 1,178
public toilets.
Currently, the city's only public restrooms are located in outdoor
parks and the subway system.
After years of complaints, local officials came up with a strategy to
provide more public toilets through a "street furniture" contract given
to private businesses by the City's Department of Transportation.
However, the contract requires installation of only 20 automatic public
toilets over a 20-year period, compared to 3,300 bus stop shelters and
330 newsstands.
"The public toilets for the city of New York should be thousands of
toilets, not a few toilets," said Steve Stollman, the founder and
organiser of the Privy Council, a group of New Yorkers who see the need
for a working system of public toilets in New York City.
"That's a joke, it's a pathetic joke -- putting a few toilets, for
example, in Brooklyn," he told IPS. "Brooklyn has two million people."
The World Toilet Association, based in South Korea, views public
toilets as a basic human right and says that municipal governments all
over the world, including New York City, should provide them free of
cost to the public.
Robert Brubaker, the programme manager of the American Restroom
Association, agrees that toilets are part of the so-called commons --
facilities that serve the basic needs of all people.
"Streetlamps, sidewalks and roads are all public goods that are
available without users' fees, and public restrooms are no different,"
he said.
But New York City largely fails to provide public restrooms -- even at
a fee.
"Sometimes people offer a dollar to use our bathroom," said Olga, a
hostess at a restaurant in midtown Manhattan.
"Of course we don't charge them for using it, but our administration
does not allow non-customers to use our restroom, so it's always hard
to say no to someone who needs natural relief," she said.
She cannot even suggest an alternative, because there are no public
bathrooms nearby. Visitors are apparently expected to map out a "toilet
itinerary" beforehand, using websites like nyrestroom.com or
bathroomdiaries.com.
More than 40 million tourists flock to New York City each year. But the
absence of bathrooms can be daunting. Altanochir, a visitor from
Mongolia, told IPS that he was limiting his liquid consumption while
walking around, so as not to be left in dire straits.
"It is a problem for New York," said Stollman of the Privy Council,
"especially for the elderly. The population is getting older, and old
people may not go out because they're afraid that they wouldn't able to
find a place to go to the bathroom."
"And that they are not going out also causes them to be, unfortunately,
more vulnerable to health conditions. So these are real health issues
that go beyond the fact of sanitation," he said.
Particularly affected is the city's large homeless population, which
numbers in the tens of thousands, including more than 16,000 children.
"What do you expect people to do? They are not welcome in respectable
establishments, and they have to go to the bathroom," Stollman said.
The city's half-hearted attempts to meet this basic human need have
been criticised for years, and some advocates say the latest strategy
is primarily aimed at making money from advertisements on the new bus
shelters, newsstands and toilets.
"Access to public restrooms should be done by better utilisation of the
assets we already have, not very expensive new construction," Stollman
said. "For example, every store that has a bathroom should be willing
to allow people to use their bathrooms."
"The city should act as an agent between the public and all of those
private entities. Then we will have thousands restrooms that will have
universal access," he added. "Instead, most deals are negotiated by
politicians that are not under close scrutiny, and the press is not
paying attention to these deals."
(END/2008)
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