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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

#241

Post by maeln »

tristor wrote: post #53

Paris has automatically self-cleaning public toilets all around and they cost around $200k each to build and install. There’s no way this is a remotely reasonable cost and is clearly a grift.

If you read the article, the main reason why it cost so much is not because of the cost of the toilet and the installation per-se, but because there is many, many red tape around doing anything in SF.

So it is not necessarily a "grift" ( although many are profiting from it and are probably more than happy about the situation being the way it is ) but the result of decades of laws to regulate public work and spending ( ironically ).

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

#242

Post by giantg2 »

glacials wrote: post #137
aliqot wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Red tape and nimbyism is hard to imagine from what I see of SFO in books, it seems like the most anti-diversity thing you can do. Can anybody from SFO relate their experience? Hard to tell these days what is editorial bias or sensationalism and what is true.

Born and raised in SF. NIMBYism is indeed a huge problem. It’s the hidden underbelly of a city with otherwise modern and diverse thinking. I’ve since moved to Seattle and it’s crazy to see shit can actually get done here.

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".

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

#243

Post by stvswn »

cjtrowbridge wrote: post #163
aliqot wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Red tape and nimbyism is hard to imagine from what I see of SFO in books, it seems like the most anti-diversity thing you can do. Can anybody from SFO relate their experience? Hard to tell these days what is editorial bias or sensationalism and what is true.

[flagged]

"a right-wing dystopia?" Seems like you'd prefer to redefine what it means to be left or right wing rather than admit that this is the outcome of left-wing governance.

The specific issues here are: tight control over building standards leading to red tape; high levels of process to ensure community review and involvement; paying more than market price for labor in order to support unions as a political value; supporting restrictive zoning to keep renters and homeowners in stable homes.

"Right-wing" imperatives did not create these issues.

Put another way, if a city elects left-wing politicians exclusively for 50 years, and those left-wing politicians enact policies and values consistent with their platforms -- it's probably not the case that negative results are because they're actually secret Republicans.

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

#244

Post by asow92 »

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…

In my personal experience of living in both rural New York and Pennsylvania and NYC for decades, the ratio seems to skew more towards the city. But I can't say as much for the west.

A $2k car is a lot less than higher average taxes and housing costs.

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

#246

Post by ceejayoz »

leereeves wrote: post #109
ceejayoz wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's straight out of the OSS (pre-CIA)'s "Simple Sabotage Field Manual". https://gist.github.com/kennwhite/467529962c184258d08f16daec... > General Interference with Organizations and Production > Insist on doing everything through "channels." Never permit short-cuts to be taken in order to expedite decisions. Make "speeches." Talk as frequently as possible and at great length. Illustrate your "points" by long anecdot…

I'm curious when the OSS, which was both founded and dissolved during WW2, had use for that advice. Were they sabotaging German bureaucracy, or American? Neither seems likely.

My understanding is it was for partisans embedded in occupied areas working in critical infrastructure and manufacturing.

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

#247

Post by jonhohle »

lr4444lr wrote: post #208
bongobingo1 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's not unreasonable to attack effects of homelessness as well as the cause. Some problems are really hard and some are just hard . In other places where it wont cost 1.7M to build one public toilet, this wouldn't be seen as such a failure or mis-step, just extending public services to people in crisis - as long as it's not seen as "fixed" by doing so.

I think the OP wanted you to consider the benefit that 1.7 million could have had in providing direct aid to preventing homelessness, e.g. rental assistance or job training.

Certainly even an existing residence or office with multiple toilets could be purchased for ≤$1.7M within city limits.

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

#248

Post by hexator »

eweise wrote: post #216
jollyllama wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

The good laborers are union workers, which drives the cost up significantly.

The actual labor costs for the workers are not the issue, they already don't make a lot and wages have stagnated for decades while costs have soared. Also, there's plenty of non-union areas that STILL have incredible costs.

Profiteering from subcontractors and suppliers is the issue. All of these bids are public, this isn't exactly forbidden knowledge.

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

#249

Post by kfarr »

nsxwolf wrote: post #229
frereubu wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Clearly" is doing a lot of work in that sentence unless you've delved deeply into the approval process of this specific toilet. It's absolutely believable that this is just produced by sclerotic bureaucracy.

What's the difference between bureaucracy and grift? All those 1.7 million dollars go into pockets, no?

Honestly it's a big difference. One is payroll and legal, the other is laundered and illegal and the feds regularly prosecute SF gov officials for this.

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

#250

Post by hot_gril »

dekhn wrote: post #127
aliqot wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Red tape and nimbyism is hard to imagine from what I see of SFO in books, it seems like the most anti-diversity thing you can do. Can anybody from SFO relate their experience? Hard to tell these days what is editorial bias or sensationalism and what is true.

SFO is the airport, not the city. We call it SF, or San Francisco.

People in tech companies with many offices tend to call cities by the nearest airport, cause that's what the local office (or datacenter) is called.
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