101–110 of 119 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you have any actual data to show that our roads and bridges are falling apart? Where I live the potholes get filled and none of our bridges have collapsed.
https://www.rpc.senate.gov/policy-papers/fixing-americas-bri...
San Francisco's 25 public toilets don't cost anything to use, but they make quite a lot in advertising revenue: https://missionlocal.org/2019/02/how-san-francisco-flushed-a... (Unfortunately, the city doesn't see much of that)
Compare that to Zurich (city proper) with 322 public toilets[2] and a population density of 12,000/sq mi[3]
I'm not surprised that people shit on the streets if they can't find a loo.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco
> 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…
That's not quite true. The federal gas tax was created specifically to fund the construction and maintenance of roads and bridges. States add their own taxes onto this.
The problem is not that no one thought about maintenance. It's that politicians have not raised the gas tax in about 30 years. Thus, steadily shrinking the amount of real dollars available for maintenance.
It's not a lack of foresight. It's a lack of political will.
> 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 hinterl…
A lot of travelers swear by McDonalds near the highways. The restrooms are clean and I've never had an issue with using them before paying. Unlike the city, where the signs are either "no public restroom" or "restroom are for paying customers only". In Portland there are a variety of restrooms built by the city but they're almost all permanently closed. Too many drug deals, drug use, sex acts, etc. The city governmen…
I wouldn't be surprised if they're all shut down now, due to Covid, but prior to that, they've always been open when I tried them.
The other public toilets in Portland, that I'm aware of, are in the parks. They're typically in heavy brick buildings. I could see those costing millions in aggregate, but they also seem likely fairly standard "build it to last" park construction. They're not automated either. As relatively large brick buildings, I would expect them to be expensive.
Regarding the point of the article—I much prefer toilets in the US to toilets in Europe. I remember trying to find a toilet at a mall in Norway and being out of luck due to not having the appropriate coin in the local currency. That's not something that would happen in the US. (Although, when I finally got in, it was quite nice.)
Another pay toilet, at a train station, was worse than disgusting. I don't know who got my coin, but that was the only deposit I made... I couldn't stand to enter the place.
In general, I'm much more confident in my ability to find a spot to do my business in the US than in Europe. Maybe because I expect to be able to swan into any coffee shop, gas station, or fast food chain (as you mentioned) and use the facilities. Although I'll admit that the bathrooms in Europe do tend to be nicer, on average, and I particularly appreciate the floor-to-ceiling dividers.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_Loo
Edit: Apparently, only 15 Portland Loos have been installed in Portland, and the city has received $362,323 in royalty payments for the design, for a net outlay of just over $1 million.
> 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…
> no Federal provision was made for their maintenance. That's not quite true. The federal gas tax was created specifically to fund the construction and maintenance of roads and bridges. States add their own taxes onto this. The problem is not that no one thought about maintenance. It's that politicians have not raised the gas tax in about 30 years. Thus, steadily shrinking the amount of real dollars available for mai…
A lack of political will might prevent Congress from raising the tax that would most economically efficiently raise revenue for highway maintenance, but it is not the primary roadblock (what is it with me and the puns today?) that prevents Congress from spending less-economically-efficiently-raised funds on infrastructure maintenance.
I don't want to seem too accusatory, but this just felt like an angry rant without much research. I've been to a few places on this earth, and while I know there are some Europeans who'll proudly talk about how paying for toilets helps keep them clean, I haven't noticed them being any better than gas station bathrooms in the US. Some are okay, some are total disaster sites. The only difference is someone or a machine…
I don't think I've ever seen a public toilet in China that flushes properly. Only those in malls in richer areas. One time, I went into a train station cubicle, looked down and saw that all the cubicles shared one channel to do your business in, and as expected, no water was passing through to wash anything away. China does not do decently in regards to toilets.
I guess that’s because Beijing is a rich region, I really don’t know, were not anywhere else
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think I've ever seen a public toilet in China that flushes properly. Only those in malls in richer areas. One time, I went into a train station cubicle, looked down and saw that all the cubicles shared one channel to do your business in, and as expected, no water was passing through to wash anything away. China does not do decently in regards to toilets.
It depends on region (and date of visit), I guess. I was in Beijing 2 years ago (so slightly pre Covid) on a business trip and while there are negatives, the toilets there were great. I guess that’s because Beijing is a rich region, I really don’t know, were not anywhere else
> Kristof and the Times, of course, would prefer a national infrastructure project to provide free toilets. If you've followed this over the years, you will see many efforts at government provided toilets. Costs are often hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the effort falls apart. There are some free toilets. In Chicago, the park district still had some. Without the incentive to charge a bit of money, they were typ…
> Ideally we'd find a way to alter the average person's behavior 33% of people are killing themselves from being obese. That also costs society money. How would you change the behaviour of people on an issue they have no personal stake in? > created by 1% of the users. So you are looking at 100% compliance?
No, that's not attainable. You'll always have people with health problems, mobility issues, young children, people with poor aim, and so on who will tend to cause a disproportionate amount of cleanliness issues. But a little more care from everyone would lessen the problem.
The Left keeps referring to things as a “human right” (housing is a human right, healthcare is a human right, etc.). I don’t totally disagree, but they mean that if something is a human right, then the government should provide it to everyone. The case for government providing healthcare to everyone is much stronger than it providing housing for everyone. Why? Because humans are much better at making decisions about…
The UK sold off much of it's public housing stock after the 1980s. The scheme was billed as a way to get poor families onto the property ladder but many of the homes were "resold" the same day to private landlords. The result is that housing is now massively unaffordable except for the highest earners and landlords. Private landlords drive up buying prices to the point that individuals cannot afford the deposit because they can extract the cost of the mortgage + profit in rent, the higher rents then make it more difficult for the individual to save the required deposit and the cycle repeats.