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Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

johnhcochrane.blogspot.com

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Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#71

Post by imgabe »

I live in Hong Kong now and coming from the US the ubiquity of public toilets never ceases to amaze me. They're everywhere, free, and relatively clean. Hong Kong does seem to have an abundance of "make work" government jobs for people to go around cleaning things.

I'm not sure why this is so difficult to implement in the US. A US solution I've heard somewhere that I think would work is that they city government should simply pay businesses to make a toilet publicly available. Make it a tax deduction enough to hire one extra employee on the condition that they have a toilet that is for the public to use without needing a key or password or whatever song and dance they make you do to use the bathroom. The stores and restaurants all have toilets they're maintaining anyway.

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#72

Post by burlesona »

solatic wrote: post #66

> The problems of public infrastructure are not money. The problems of American public infrastructure are exactly money, which is to say, the differences in funding capital projects versus funding maintenance. Forget public toilets for a second - one of the reasons why America's roads and bridges are falling apart is because they were built with Federal dollars, but no Federal provision was made for their maintenance…

This is true.

It’s also true that the US system is relatively unique among western nations in being skewed in favor of rural rather than urban interests. The US has the most extensive and in many cases over-developed rural infrastructure in the world, and that creates an enormous maintenance and funding drain compared to many nations that invest principally in their major cities and not so much in their rural hinterlands. Perhaps the most extreme counter-example being Singapore which has no rural hinterlands.

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#73

Post by airhead969 »

ggm wrote: post #2

I live in an economy with ubiquitous free toilets and they do not all descend to the unbearable. Socialised maintenance of the commons takes many forms. Only a reductionist believes the absence of paid toilets reduces toilets to the unspeakably bad. I concede the best toilets are free, but gatekept by transactional relationships of higher worth. The razors I steal from Singapore Airlines majestic marble temples in ch…

Yep. It's the capitalist mindset that disregards privilege and the suffering of the homeless because it's more expedient to scapegoat them in the name of a false dichotomy: "progress" and "ruin."

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#74

Post by HKH2 »

Clewza313 wrote: post #58
whiddershins wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believed you that you might be saying accurate things until you wrote ‘even China does pretty decently.’ I spent two weeks traveling around China and, when it comes to toilets, what you said couldn’t be more insanely inaccurate. I decline to go into details, but it’s is in every way the opposite of what you wrote.

China is huge and fast-developing, so generalizations are dangerous. The notorious partitionless poop trough is pretty much a thing of the past (although I have no doubt some survive), but these days at eg. major train stations or tourist sites, the average public toilet is just fine.

"Parks and urban areas across the country have toilets that are well maintained..." is referring to far more than just major train stations and tourist sites.

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#75

Post by airhead969 »

imgabe wrote: post #71

I live in Hong Kong now and coming from the US the ubiquity of public toilets never ceases to amaze me. They're everywhere, free, and relatively clean. Hong Kong does seem to have an abundance of "make work" government jobs for people to go around cleaning things. I'm not sure why this is so difficult to implement in the US. A US solution I've heard somewhere that I think would work is that they city government shoul…

Los Angeles, as an example, has countless "no public restroom" and "restroom for customers only" signs because it's an exclusionary class thing that "those people" don't deserve to fulfill biological needs. I suggest they throw their excrement at such signs until they give in.

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#77

Post by tkgally »

patio11 wrote: post #39

This is always a fun thing to explain to people at home in Tokyo. "Oh wow this office building put the toilet outside the security cordon." "What." "Well the guard checking badges is there and the toilet is outside that, so, well, that would never happen [in a big city in US]." "... Do you think the valuable things in this building are stored... in the toilet?" "Ah, no, that's not the nature of the problem." "What is…

In addition to the economic, political, and social factors discussed elsewhere in these comments, the notion of “taboo” also, I think, helps to explain the difference between the availability of public toilets in the U.S. and in Japan (and maybe other Asian countries). Nicholas Kristof’s column has a kind of “taboo-breaking” undertone, as if he is aware that he is writing about a subject that would normally not be mentioned in the New York Times. And, in fact, I don’t recall seeing similar articles more than a few times before in nearly six decades of reading mainstream U.S. print media.

In contrast, in Japan, where I’ve been reading mainstream newspapers for nearly four decades, the topic is not taboo at all, and it’s not unusual to see articles about public toilets and related matters. A search at Google News in Japanese now finds recent articles (some paywalled, all in Japanese) about a survey of public toilets in Okayama City [1], a move to build more Western-style public toilets in Matsumoto City [2], a video released by Chiba Prefecture to promote better manners by users of public toilets [3], installation of a self-cleaning toilet in a park in Kamiamakusa City [4], and (timed to the tenth anniversary of the Fukushima disaster) local governments preparing emergency toilets for future disasters [5]. Most of these articles seem to be based on press releases from local governments.

[1] https://www.sanyonews.jp/article/1107034

[2] https://www.shimintimes.co.jp/news/2021/03/post-12877.php

[3] https://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXZQOFB168BZ0W1A210C2000000/

[4] https://kumanichi.com/news/id128124

[5] https://www.niigata-nippo.co.jp/news/politics/20210309603080...

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#78

Post by airhead969 »

upbeat_general wrote: post #56
whiddershins wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is the downside to making it legal to charge for the bathroom? Like, what exactly.

Some (including me) might find it morally wrong.

Monetize every biological necessity: it's the American way!

Oxygen, water, food, sleep, sex, socialization, excretion, entertainment, industriousness: 6 out of 8 ain't bad, but those two more are attainable if we change attitudes through a holistic social media and mass marketing campaign.

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#79

Post by airhead969 »

floren wrote: post #50
WuTangCFO wrote: post #34

I have lived in London, NZ, Australia. All have had free toilets. Why? Growing up in NZ free bathrooms were normal so we take it for granted. Yes, a small population means that these facilities were less likely to be abused. But London? In Shoreditch, a part of East London that is full of pubs and hipsters quaffing the Devil's Dandruff the council sets up urinals in the street where any punter can see you pissing but…

Certainly not a new thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pissoir It will not be implemented in SF because it's only suitable for men. Switzerland appears to have created a solution for women by providing disposable paper "funnels" so the ladies can use it too, but because people lack any decency they would all be stolen within minutes in SF--and if you think creating a male-only public urinal won't fly in SF, just wa…

Belgium towns often have these out for festivals and other events. Shaped like an X about 1.5 to 2m high and about 2 x 2m with a yellow hose draining to the nearest sewer. If they didn't, dudes would just pee wherever. I bet that women are out-of-luck and just go somewhere discreet.

Re: Pay toilets and NYT: a free market microcosm

#80

Post by airhead969 »

WuTangCFO wrote: post #34

I have lived in London, NZ, Australia. All have had free toilets. Why? Growing up in NZ free bathrooms were normal so we take it for granted. Yes, a small population means that these facilities were less likely to be abused. But London? In Shoreditch, a part of East London that is full of pubs and hipsters quaffing the Devil's Dandruff the council sets up urinals in the street where any punter can see you pissing but…

Maybe. There's nowhere free to pee in Victoria. Victoria station's bathroom costs money.
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