Toilet – Public toilets

Public Toilets

Public facilities often have many toilets partitioned by stalls (US) or “cubicles” (UK), with the washing facilities in a separate area where other people of the same sex are present. The washing area may be common to both sexes. Facilities for men often also have separate urinals, either wall-mounted fixtures designed for a single user, or a constantly-draining basin or trough for collective use. Wall-mounted urinals are sometimes separated by small partitions or other obstructions for privacy, i.e., to keep the user’s genitals hidden from public view.

Outdoor public toilets (in the street, around parks, etc.) are a form of street furniture. For mixed sex arrangements, there are cubicles varying from simple devices with little or no plumbing to more luxurious versions that automatically clean themselves after every use (for the latter, see Sanisette). Facilities without walls all around are typically for urination only, and for men only; although passers-by can see the urinating men from the back, they cannot see the genitals. These street urinals are known as “pissoirs” after the French term (see Urinal).

Some facilities are mobile and can thus be put in place where and when needed, e.g., for a weekend at an entertainment venue. Additionally, some can be sunk into the ground (and thereby made inoperable) for the periods that they are less needed. The idea behind this is that some people do not like the sight of a public toilet in the street, and they are more easily hidden than repeatedly moved. This type is typically installed in entertainment areas and made operational during weekend evenings and nights. People tend to be less shy about using it at these times, generally, because they are drunk.

A Port-a-john is an outdoor public toilet with walls which can either be connected to the local sewage system or store the waste and be emptied from time to time. Many toilets can be cleaned on the spot, or at a central location in the case of a mobile toilet or urinal. In Europe public toilets are also set up for cities as a compensation for advertising permits. They are part of a street furniture contract between the out-of-home advertising company and the city council. The reason for this combination is the shortage in city budgets.

Public Toilets

Some public toilets may be used free of charge, but others require payment. Payment can be accomplished by :

• putting money on an unattended plate
• putting money in a box with a slot
• putting money in the slot of a turnstile or spring-door
• giving the money to a toilet attendant (who is sometimes also in charge of the cleaning)

The practice of charging for use of public conveniences is the origin of the British euphemism for urination, to spend a penny; this was the standard charge for public lavatories from the Great Exhibition of 1851, which featured the world’s first public water closets, until the decimalisation of Britain’s coinage in 1971. Charging for public urination also gives rise to the French term for a urinal, “vespasienne”; this is directly derived from the Roman nickname for a street-side urine collection pot, whose contents were used in laundry and taxed by the Emperor Vespasian.

Many train stations and bus terminals have installed pay toilets during the 1950s and 1960s. Most of these have since been removed because of vandalism on the pay lock mechanisms.

The use of pay toilets has been made illegal by some municipalities. In other locations, public restrooms must have one free toilet for every 4 to 5 pay toilets.

In the past some businesses used the payment system to limit access to toilets and this is still accomplished by use of a key system for patrons only or outright denying access to all of the public. In most areas this is illegal for public (stadiums for example) and government buildings.

Public Toilet

In the United Kingdom it is technically permitted to charge for water closets, but not for the use of gentlemen’s urinals.

Separation by sex is characteristic of public toilets to the extent that pictograms of a man or a woman are used to indicate where the respective toilets are. These pictograms are sometimes (e.g., in California) enclosed within standard geometric forms to reinforce this information, with a circle representing a women’s toilet and a triangle representing a men’s facility. Pictograms such as those shown at the right (from the D.O.T.) have been criticized for perpetuating gender stereotypes; however, there may be no practical alternatives.

Many European toilet doors used to be (and still sometimes are) only marked “WC”, which can cause confusion to non-Europeans. Similarly, in the Philippines the label “CR” (comfort room) is common, which is equally unintuitive to overseas visitors.

Sex-separated public toilets are a source of difficulty for some people. For example, people with children of the opposite sex must choose between bringing the child into a toilet not designated for the child’s gender, or entering a toilet not designated for one’s own. Men caring for babies often find that only the women’s washroom has been fitted with a change table. Disabled persons who need help in the bathroom have an additional problem if their helper is the opposite sex. One suggestion is that toilets for handicapped people not be sex-separated.

Sex-separated public toilets are often difficult to negotiate for transgendered or androgynous people, who are often subject to embarrassment, harassment, or even assault or arrest by others offended by the presence of a person they interpret as being of the other gender (whether due to their outward presentation or their genital status). Transgendered people have been arrested for using not only bathrooms that correspond to their gender of identification, but also ones that correspond to the gender they were assigned at birth.

Public Toilets

Many existing public toilets are gender-neutral. Additionally, some public places (such as facilities targeted to the transgendered or homosexual communities, and a few universities and offices) provide individual washrooms that are not gender-specified, specifically in order to respond to the concerns of gender-variant people; but this remains very rare and often controversial. Various courts have ruled on whether transgendered people have the right to use the washroom of their gender of identification.

A significant number of facilities have additional gender-neutral public toilets for a different reason — they are marked not for being for females or males, but as being accessible to persons with disabilities, and are adequately equipped to allow a person using a wheelchair and/or with mobility concerns to use them.

Another recent development in public toilets is the “family restroom”. Family restrooms are unisex but unlike other unisex bathrooms that allow only one user at a time, the family restroom contains multiple stalls designed for maximum privacy and communal washing area for use by both genders. The family restroom is designed so that a parent with a young child of the opposite gender can bring the child into the restroom with them without the concerns associated with single-gender restrooms. Family restrooms have started appearing in newly-built sports stadiums, amusement parks, shopping malls, and major museums.

Public Toilets

Toilets in private homes are almost never separated by sex. However, the size of a home or facility bears on the availability of options. Small establishments are limited by their space to the toilet options they can offer; it is more common to find a higher number of choices in a large facility. The same is true for homes; in more affluent households in the USA, where the homes are usually larger, bathrooms are also often more spacious than average, and more numerous. In such homes, bathrooms (especially master bathrooms) are increasingly being designed with an small adjoining room exclusively for the toilet, as well as separate washing basins. This makes it easier for couples who share a bathroom to maintain their desired level of privacy and personal space. In Australia, it has long been the case that the toilet is in a separate room from the bathroom.

There are usually toilets in airlines, regional rail trains, and often in long-distance buses and ferries, but not in metros, trams, and other buses. In trains they may have a reservoir, or the contents may simply fall on the tracks, hence the notice which appears in many train toilets: “Please do not flush while the train is standing at a station”.