centre of the universe - the dreaming: Open Letter

10/22/2004: "Open Letter" An Open Letter to the Designers and Manufacturers of Public Toilets

To Whom it May Concern:

There must be many difficult choices you face when you design public toilets. I understand many architects and engineers may think of toilets last when they design buildings, and while public spaces are usually designed for the use and enjoyment of as many people as possible, the issue of public toilets probably comes in third or fourth. You must have to worry about how to get the most people in and going and how to design the facilities so that turnover is easy and as unobtrusive as possible. You must also have concerns about hygeine and public safety. Nowhere is this more evident than in women's toilets.

Most men's toilets, from what I understand, can be as simple as a trough in the floor all along the wall with drains every so far and little cakes of chlorine and some kind of substance that, while attempting to mask or overpower the scent of stale urine, usually makes the men's smell like floral pee. On the other hand, the men's toilet could be much more elaborate, with moving sidewalks, circus music playing in the background, and giant projection televisions broadcasting the lastest sporting event so that the gents have to miss nothing while they answer nature's call.

I should like to bring to your attention, however, the issue of cramming as many women in to the toilet as possible and what possibly may have been overlooked by what I can only assume is a majority of male architects and/or designers. First of all, most women are wider than the allowable door space alloted to each 'privacy ensured' stall. This means women must turn sideways while entering the stall. This would not be an issue but for the following:
1) Encumbrances.
a) Perhaps it is the case that most of the designers and manufacturers of public toilets live in balmy sub-tropical climates where no one ever has need of a parka, mitts, scarves, toques, and/or longjohns. Unfortunately, there are many people in the world who have been taught since sprogs to dress in layers. Many, many, many layers.
b) Many women carry purses, which add to one's width.
c) Many women also lead small children to the toilet; small children who not only decrease the amount of 'free space' within the stall, but who are also quite able to squip underneath the doors and walls and out into freedom whilst its mother is caught with her pants down around her ankles, holding up the parka with one hand and attempting to dig bits of toilet tissue out from inside a malfunctioning dispenser with the other hand.

2) Pregnancy
As a woman expands with growing child, it becomes increasingly more difficult to 'slip' between the door and the frame of a toilet stall that is barely wide enough to shimmy through in the middle of summer by scantily clad and serenely skinny young women. Once through the door, the pregnant woman must manoeuver herself between the wall and the dispenser and the sanitary napkin disposal unit while removing pants/skirt/shorts, holding on to a purse (one can't actually hang one's purse on the hangers in the stall, as Oprah explains, because it's so easy for someone to reach over the top and retrive said purse while purse's owner is...otherwise engaged), and trying to see if there's any tissue left in the dispenser.

3) Physiology
While some women are adept at the squat and don't mind using public toilets without fear of the contamination of one's nether-region by any number of unsavoury critters (microscopic or otherwise), the majority of women loathe the experience of having to sit where countless others have sat. Countless other nameless bums that have adorned the throne. Bums of unknown origin and, quite probably, nefarious reputations. God only knows how many of those bums are afflicted with scabies, psoriasis, or any other variety of cooties. Certainly, for toilets not equipped with thin paper toilet seat covers and/or sanitizing foam/gel, one can strategically place four separate lengths of toilet tissue over the seat. And many women do this. And it is incredibly disconcerting when you realise that the seat was wet *before you started*. A pitfall of the squat. The bottom line (if you'll pardon the pun) is that all of this manoeuvering is difficult at the best of times when one's attention is being drawn to one's insistent bladder, and very nearly impossible when one's movement is further resricted by any of the conditions mentioned above.

As you can see, all of these circumstances combine to make the woman's experience in the public toilet an unneccessary harassment. In the future, please have a female consultant on staff; preferably one of 'average' or at least 'normal' size and girth. A woman whose curves curve in the right places (even one who has a few extra curves, if need be), whose purse carries more than a single lipstick and three dollars in change, who has corralled small children with peanut-sized bladders through the public washroom gauntlet in the past - a woman who does *not* squat, and nor should she have to. Please ask this woman to have twenty of her closest friends test the design for quality assurance (thereby having a minimum of forty women testing).

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,
A concerned citizen.

P.S. If there are 14 stalls in the toilet, why are there only two sinks?

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6 Comments

Terry , on Friday, 22nd October:

Your interpretation of the mens room is correct... Well at least up until the "...some kind of substance that, while attempting to mask or overpower the scent of stale urine.." Nope, it's pretty much stale urine smell.

Thanks for clearing up why it takes women so darn long in there. Precisely placing strips of toilet paper must be time consuming. Umm... what exactly does that save you from again? As someone who just sits on the seat (well, I will wipe it if it's wet) I'm curious what risk I am taking.

"If there are 14 stalls, why 2 sinks?"

Umm, I think you are supposed to take turns.

cenobyte , on Friday, 22nd October:

Of *course* you're supposed to take turns, but why, if you're trying to get folks in and out of there efficiently, force them to line up? All it does is prompt people to not wash their hands properly. How many people have you seen actually spend more than thirteen seconds washing their hands in public toilets? If you have 14 stalls, the least you can do is have 7 sinks.

See, I don't think guys have as much risk sitting down, because they don't use the public toilet for sitting as much as the women do. Most women sit down *every time they go*. Most men only sit down once a day. Uh, from what I've heard. Which means that the women's toilet seats are getting propotionately WAAAAAAY more action than the men's.

Which exposes one to more germs, awkward, previously un-noticed dampness, and particularly athletic gential lice.

Yes, I know it's impossible to contract genital lice (or nearly any other STD) from public toilets unless you're in there with a partner doing things you probably oughtn't be doing in a public toilet, which is probably why you're in there doing it in the first place. But that doesn't mean the thought doesn't cross your mind when you're looking down at a dingy toilet seat, having to sit next to an overflowing disposal bin (let's not talk about aromas).

I realise that does have more to do with the cleanliness of the toilet than with the design, but I'm just saying...if there was more room to move about in each stall, one could take a little more caution in one's positioning.

Der Kaptin , on Friday, 22nd October:

Two other points to help ease your fevered mind, if only a smidgeon -- 1. Psoriasis isn't actually contagious, so relax
2. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, if the seat is wet in the women's, it's because the water in the bowl splashes in the refilling process, no other reason.

I once wrote a piece about why, among other reasons like multiple orgasms and the like, women should be happy to be women because it means they don't have to ever use the men's public toilet. They are hugely disgusting.

Back in the sixties, there was actually this article about how someone had done a cross-canada survey of public, gas station, toilets, and discovered how dirty the women's cans were. It was this huge scandal -- the little homemakers were pigs on the road. I never did believe it, and I'm less likely than ever to give it any credence now. Some petty little iconoclast came up with that piece of...excrement, before going on to serve in Brian Mulroney's cabinet.

The thing that really bugs me about design in the mens is the seats that gap in the front. Sweet pissing Jesus, who ever thought this was a good idea. So even if the previous occupant was considerate enough to flip the seat out of the way, and only got the rim totally wet, flipping it down won't cover the problem. And in the most crucial location. Whoever designed that little nickle-saving inconvenience should be shot and, you know, urinated on.

I'm guessing that the thinking is if someone is so pregnant they can't fit between the paper dispenser and napkin dispenser, they are expected to have already entered their...confinement!! (shit-eating grin emoticon)

And the last word on the sinks/toilets ratio - you could have more than two sinks, but then you'd have to have less than 14 toilets. Can't have everything.

Terry , on Friday, 22nd October:

In the men's room, there's usually a handicapped toilet that is much larger than the rest. I would expect that a pregnant woman would qualify and could use the larger stall.

"having to sit next to an overflowing disposal bin (let's not talk about aromas)"

Interesting tidbit about Brazil... Most of the plumbing there can't handle flushing toilet paper, so there is a convenient pail next to the toilet for you to dispose of your dirty toilet paper. Keeping in mind the heat and humidity, you can imagine that I'm laughing at what you consider an 'aroma'. ;)

cenobyte , on Friday, 22nd October:

I would take rancid feces and urine over rancid menstrual blood any day.

Terry , on Friday, 22nd October:

Umm... whatever made you think it was a choice? It's not A or B... it's A AND B.

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