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San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

sfchronicle.com

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Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#321

Post by josephcsible »

galdosdi wrote: post #218
asow92 wrote: post #160

Why is it that the deepest blue areas of the country have some of the most abject inequity and poverty? It seems that there's a fine line between compassion and enablement when it comes to the deep blue municipalities of New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, etc. Sure the rustbelt, deep south, and Appalachia are areas with similar problems and mixed politics, but they also somehow feel different.

The destitute are merely more visible in "big dense blue cities" but statistically there are more of them in rural red places like Mississippi and Oklahoma. After all, in OK or MS you need a car, which is a $2000+ asset, just to even access any public space or resource or make yourself visible at all. There's much more poverty in those places, but it is hidden away. You can see a slight bit of it at gas stations that…

> I would much rather be destitute in a big city where I can access all kinds of formal and informal resources like temp agencies or subways to sleep on, than in a rural area

This is why so many commuters forego cities' public transit in favor of driving.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#322

Post by mellavora »

fdewrewrewf wrote: post #192
mellavora wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We start regarding public servants with some respect instead of someone to be yelled at. A culture shift. You are right more regulations/another layer isn't going to help.

A culture shift, yes. Back to the idea that public servants are indeed servants to the public, and their entire purpose is to spend the public's money in a way that benefits the public.

I've heard horror stories on HN which would justify your cynicism, and agree that corruption is a problem. See also issues with police and accountability.

You might be surprised, however, at what percentage of federal bureaocracy does see themselves as civil servants.

The culture shift can be done. And it is well worth it, for everyone's sake. Corruption represents a Nash equilibrium, once rooted it is very hard to remove.

That's why I'm defending government workers here. We want good, effective government. This requires good, effective people to carry out the work. Making this respectable and letting those people do their job is pretty key to getting that good government.

The principles aren't so different from managing a team of software engineers. Would you enjoy working (in software) in a company where sales and marketing was always blaming the engineers, and HR was always calling the engineers lazy, and management was constantly shifting priorities while blaming engineers for not hitting targets, etc...

So why create the same environment for government workers? Why not treat them with the same professional respect you'd expect/hope for in your job?

And why not call out the politician as the a*hat when he insults the people trying to get the job done?

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#323

Post by perfectstorm »

mattnewton wrote: post #206

One of the reasons this toilet is so expensive no doubt, is that the new SF public toilets are self cleaning and will have attendants on duty to try to prevent this. The one on golden gate park and Haight closes after each visitor to spray the inside down like a dishwasher, and has an attendant on duty to make sure no one is inside while it does that (and to generally discourage people from shady stuff). It's not per…

why not have a full time janitor who cleans after each visit? much cheaper than a self cleaning toilet. even if you pay $100k to the janitor in annual salary, it will take 10+yrs to reach 1.7M and who knows what kind of issues these self cleaning toilets will have in that 10yrs.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#324

Post by at_a_remove »

aliqot wrote: post #202
cjtrowbridge wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

In what ways is SFO right wing? I don't see much representation of that type as far as elected officials. Is this a term used in spirit or something I'm overlooking?

If something has problems, it's due to the right wing, naturally. The far right, because there's no such thing as being just a little right. Alt-right if it's citizen-led and not overly Christian.

Overall, it's just a manifestation of "if we were only just a little more left, things would work out!" you'll see.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#325

Post by [deleted] »

melony wrote: post #225
hotpotamus wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

> The public toilet will be built by union workers who will “earn a living wage and benefits,” San Francisco doesn't owe anything to the tradespeople. When you share a border with Mexico, there is absolutely no reason not to outsource. Almost every city that can rapidly scale up infrastructure have access to some type of cheap labour. The rapid construction in the middle east and asia didn't happen by using union lab…

[deleted]

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#326

Post by BitwiseFool »

jollyllama wrote: post #161
hedora wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have an access road that was sized for utility trucks. We had to widen it slightly because of obscure California regulations. Widening it didn’t cost $1.7M. However, the cost per linear foot was within a factor of two of buying a line of Tesla Model 3s. This is in an unincorporated (rural) area, on a farm. The work lasted one rainstorm before needing extensive repairs. I’m completely unsurprised that building a hu…

Too many bureaucrats and construction profiteers, not enough good laborers.

I sincerely wonder if we have 'democratized' infrastructure and construction too much.

>"First, an architect needs to draw plans for the toilet, which will then be presented to the public for feedback. The Arts Commission’s Civic Design Review committee will be responsible for conducting a “multi-phase review” of the project, like it does for all projects on public lands. According to the Arts Commission’s website, “the committee evaluates each project’s design, scale and massing for accessibility, safety and aesthetic merit.” The review process “ensures that each project’s design is appropriate to its context in the urban environment, and that structures of the highest design quality reflect their civic stature.”"

I recognize that the verbiage of this quote is probably standard for construction projects in the city, and it sounds absurdly out of place for a project of this scale. That being said, at some point our elected officials just need to delegate authority and let them act mostly autonomously.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#327

Post by josh2600 »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #297
michaelscott wrote: post #49

> San Francisco, which is struggling with a troubling homelessness and public-defecation crisis, needs more public toilets. The irony in this statement, given the reasons why this toilet costs so much, is absolutely unreal. I had to check the date on this article to make sure it wasn't an old April's Fools skit or something, but it seems red tape and NIMBYism have escalated to such a degree in SF that (a) securing bu…

Is this the real SF experience? Or is it media hype? I’m completely unfamiliar with the city. My only experience of America is staying in Atlanta for 6 months during an exchange program, but that was years back. Some of the stories of bureaucratic meddling and political corruption sound like something I’d see back home in India. Always had this impression that America was above that.

America is really big. You’ll find a high level of variance across the country just like you will in most g20 countries.

Big cities have lots of problems and lots of desirable features. It’s a toss up.

Having recently returned from Japan to San Francisco, I find myself longing for a city which has less crime and more functioning infrastructure, but having grown up here it’s hard to leave my friends.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#328

Post by aliqot »

Kalium wrote: post #286
aliqot wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for your perspective on this. In my locale, this type of thing is hard to imagine, we'll feed anybody who can hold a fork here. We have almost zero resources for indigents here, so homeless and others without are a bit rare. What are the resources (aside from this restroom) afforded to those without, near SFO? I'm tempted to think about this time when a local made a habit of feeding the deer, eventually the…

https://hsh.sfgov.org/ And that's just the resources from the city. There's a bunch of non-profits and a generally permissive public attitude. As to that question... it's a difficult one to answer. My understanding is that it's both difficult to study and politically sensitive.

>it's both difficult to study and politically sensitive.

Unfortunately I think you're right. A lot of delicate conversations fall into this category, and not just in SFO. As time passes my perspective shifts and I begin to realize our actions being at odds with our beliefs is not an ideologically linked trait, it is an innate quality of humanity.

It is as if having the correct belief-system is sufficient and on par with actually living those values- the emotional reward is the same.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#329

Post by giantg2 »

PuppyTailWags wrote: post #261
giantg2 wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would the NIMBYism contribute to that cost? I can see construction costs being somewhat higher with COL and regulations, but you could solve this problem with one of those toilet trailers or a porta-john (or cinder block and other materials are relatively cheap). Seems like they want a certain "look".

My understanding is that NIMBYism also takes the form of adding multiple barriers to changing the neighborhood. Environmental permit, safety permit, approving architectural proposals prior to implementation, limitations on who does the construction, how the materials are sourced, approvals on construction times and schedules, etc. The people building it might need to hire lawyers to draft proposals formally to local…

I thought most of the permits would be be moot on cost if it's the city paying itself for permits.

Re: San Francisco is spending $1.7M on one public toilet

#330

Post by asow92 »

josephcsible wrote: post #321
galdosdi wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The destitute are merely more visible in "big dense blue cities" but statistically there are more of them in rural red places like Mississippi and Oklahoma. After all, in OK or MS you need a car, which is a $2000+ asset, just to even access any public space or resource or make yourself visible at all. There's much more poverty in those places, but it is hidden away. You can see a slight bit of it at gas stations that…

> I would much rather be destitute in a big city where I can access all kinds of formal and informal resources like temp agencies or subways to sleep on , than in a rural area This is why so many commuters forego cities' public transit in favor of driving.

I've literally seen someone shit in a subway before, and as we know, single toilets can cost millions of dollars in cities for some reason.
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