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Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Hey 3CDC! Check out Portland’s Public Potty Project!
Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
Photo courtesy of here.
While 3CDC defends the closure of the Fountain Square restrooms, claiming that some cities don’t offer any toilets at public venues, places like Portland are emerging as innovative leaders in the realm of providing this basic public service to all citizens. It seems significant that Portland would be the City leading the way in terms of public bathroom designs that fight crime, drug use and vandalism—particularly since Cincinnati has modeled its streetcar proposal after them. How telling, the manner with which Cincinnati will pick-and-choose those aspects of Portland’s pubic policy to imitate, showing once again that Cincinnati does not put its people first. Or rather, that it only puts certain people first.
This afternoon, The Cincinnati Beacon spoke with Anna DiBenedetto, staff assistant to Portland Commissioner Randy Leonard. His office has been leading a groundbreaking new approach to crime resistant, cost-effective public toilets. These new facilities will address all the complaints typical of those who oppose readily available public restrooms—from drug use, to prostitution, to the so-called problem of homeless bathing in sinks.
“The idea is to grant less privacy and to make them less comfortable so people spent less time in the bathroom,” said DiBenedetto. “This will encourage self-policing in high traffic areas.” DiBenedetto shared this link, which shows an artists rendering of the prototype. Here is an embedded view:
To the right, you can see a counter protruding from the opposite side. That’s because the handwashing facilities are on the outside. DiBenedetto said small solar panels and insulation will stop the water from freezing in the winter, and the external washing station will discourage bathing while enabling public oversight and enforcement.
You can also see, from the slatted design at the bottom, that legs would be immediately obvious to anyone passing—including police officers, who DiBenedetto say would have keys to each facility. So, if there were more than one person in the facility (due to something like prostitution, for example) it would be exposed and, once again, the public and/or police could easily patrol and provide oversight.
“These are so utilitarian we think they can be affordable,” said DiBenedetto. She said they will have panels behind the toilets for pull-out hoses, in case the facilities get dirty. Custodians can easily just hose them down, with waste falling into a grate and into the sewer system below.
Additionally, DiBenedetto said these would be open 24 hours a day, every day of the year. Portland is looking to place them from parks to City streets.
Quite a different philosophy than the corporate persons who took over Cincinnati’s premier public space, given away freely by City Hall politicians.
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03 Sep 2008 at 10:19 pm | #
.
We would argue that public showers and laundry are needed, as well.
Why do we find: politicians elected to represent all people only represent those they feel desirable ?
Personal dignity and hygiene is preventative health, thus, saving tax-payers money in the long term.
Not to mention the facilitation of employment prospects.
.
03 Sep 2008 at 10:59 pm | #
Great idea. Seattle did the same thing a few years ago in fact. Yet another progressive City in this country. They even spent 5 million dollars on them, and they were self cleaning. Oh wait! It didn’t work because it’s a stupid idea. They even tried selling them for next to nothing on Ebay and got no bidders. Genius.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008075545_ebay27m.html
04 Sep 2008 at 04:20 am | #
No, Seattle did NOT do the same thing. Portland is aware of what happened with them, and these units are totally different. But of course you know that already—this is just another example of the extremes with which you will engage to distort truth to defend 3CDC.
As you can see from the picture at your link, they don’t even look alike. The Seattle units were pay units, with doors that would open automatically after a set time. People could just jam the electric units and keep the doors closed. Totally different concept.
Try again.
04 Sep 2008 at 07:02 am | #
Those are pretty interesting. The concept of limiting privacy is a bit weird, but it makes sense. It is important to note that the ones in Seattle are entirely different and that even though those didn’t work in Seattle they have been fine in other cities. It has a lot to do with where they are placed and how they are maintained. I used one similar to those in Seattle in Boston and it was great. Cincinnati should have bought them from ebay.
04 Sep 2008 at 07:38 am | #
Not good if you got the runs.
04 Sep 2008 at 08:39 pm | #
Why wouldn’t the City of Cincinnati be the ones to institute this plan?
06 Sep 2008 at 02:19 am | #
Why does the City of Cincinnati provide an abundance of port-o-potties during “October Fest” or “The Taste of Cincinnati” downtown, but none for the homeless? Why does the City of Cincinnati allow CMHA to demolish thousands of housing units at a time when so many people are losing their jobs and their homes? Why does Cincinnati close the restrooms in Washington Park at night? When has Cincinnati ever done anything to encourage its poor to stick around? We don’t exist for them, as long as they can keep us out of sight. Vera Z
06 Sep 2008 at 08:19 am | #
This subject shows the faults with blog comments and our media in the USA.
No Bearman, Seattle’s toilets were free.
No Anon, it is not a stupid idea but you have decided to grab an exception and make it the rule.
Dean, it was good that you picked up a phone and called the person in Portland, but now you need to read about the subject in a real newspaper:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/17/us/17toilets.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Seattle&st=cse&oref=slogin ,
and then, you need to call the person back and grille her a little. It appears to me that Portland will be another case where some city worker will be reinventing the wheel at the expense of Portland citizens as did Seattle and when her new ideas don’t work she will find another job in the city administration to be an expert in a new field.
The best thing that I saw in one of the Seattle news reports was that it listed the names of the council people that voted for the toilets. Although in this case, I don’t feel that it should be held against the aye voters other than they obviously failed to talk to J. C.Decaux or others that have thousands of these units around the world.
And once again the local newspapers were more interested in splash to see a couple of newspaper that to present the facts. And once more the local newspapers were unwilling to ask embarrassing questions of the local government because they are more interested in protecting the image of the market in which the sell newspapers. The Seattle newspaper probably was a low-paid naive liberal arts lass who was more interested in demonstrating her writing style than and appearing creative than getting facts to the public and her editor is not better but probably a little older.
As I said in another thread, I tried to get some interest in these toilets twenty some years ago in Cincinnati. I don’t know if they will work here because downtown may not have the critical mass to support the advertising and the mentality of city hall is directed to rid themselves of the poor through displacement and city hall will definitely view the toilets as promoting the poor even though ninety-eight percent of the users may be of average income.
Seattle’s toilets served 500 to 700 persons a day and that isn’t bad considering Seattle did not service the toilets. It would probably be the same here because Cincinnati has a history of acting like a slumlord to the poor. The closing of the toilets on Fountain Square is typical of the Cincinnati administration which fails to put restrooms in inner-city parks and have removed or locked port-a-lets in inner city work projects where local tried to use them.
Vera Z is asking the right questions. The answer is it is typical Cincinnati mentality and that is why many creative people leave this hole.
06 Sep 2008 at 08:26 am | #
Dean!
Do you or anyone see a problem with the intents of Portland in DiBenedtto’s statement:
This is typical dumb! This is something I would expect from Cincinnati.
06 Sep 2008 at 08:38 am | #
Dieter,
Do you comprehend that the toilets in the article you cited are NOT the same as the Portland project? Why in the world would I call her back to question her further about the failure of different toilets, in a different city, with different designs, and so forth? You make no sense!
The bottom line, and the overall point of the article, is this: 3CDC apologists point to “other cities” to defend closing the potties on the Square. But what “other cities” should we look at? How about Portland, whose streetcar proposal we love so much. They are doing the OPPOSITE of 3CDC.
06 Sep 2008 at 09:36 am | #
Dean!
C’mon Dean, this is not about a specific toilet nor a specific city. This is not about one specific design characteristic that made these toilets not work in Seattle. This is about dealing with one social problem and how different groups are dealing with it and about the typical failings of government bureaucracy and societies. It is the social and government mentalities that we are looking at.
While you and others are putting Portland on a pedestal, it is not far from Cincinnati in approaching problems. Seattle did not work because they set up restrictions on advertising for just one point and then had the anti-poor mentality that the poor aren’t worth any amenities. Then the people expect the poor to have respect for values of the more affluent. With Seattle it was one mistake after another that led to the failure.
And it is about the news media that fails to inform so that one failure will cause many cities to be able to reject the needs of the poor because they can always point to Seattle without any analysis.
It is why this country muddles along far below its potential because there is no accountability in government. It is about our media that does not inform so that a microscopic few ever have input into addressing a problem because the general public is kept in ignorance.
Why do these units work throughout the world but fail in the USA?
Why can’t Seattle sell these units on ebay? Actually, this question alone, if given enough consideration should keep you thinking and searching for some time. I don’t know what you can’t see that here? It is not about a design. The JC DeCaux design has to be thirty years old and is relatively primitive when compared to the technology that is available today. The hardware is simple the mental process of implementation and analysis is what is at fault.
06 Sep 2008 at 10:25 am | #
Dieter,
You obviously can’t read. The Seattle units had automatic doors that could be jammed. The Portland prototypes do not. The Seattle units allowed people to be locked in total privacy, leading to drug use and prostitution. The Portland prototypes do not allow for that. The Seattle units quickly got dirty. The Portland prototypes have a solution for that problem, too.
In fact, everything that went wrong in Seattle, the Portland prototype has a concept to remedy.
Now, if you insist that you know what you are talking about, provide a quotation from the article that has any bearing on the Portland prototype, and justify your answer.
Hint: you cannot.
06 Sep 2008 at 05:20 pm | #
…
I wish I knew to what specifically you were referring.
the Portland people have actually done a stellar job but you and the general media, IE the Seattle Times, have done a poor job of reporting or making available enough facts for the public to make an intelligent opinion on the subject.
Actually, the Portland units or at least some of them can be jammed. Portland has many different types. There is a Portland web site that gives you more information about the decision process and analysis that you will want to read. I think that I referenced it in one of my earlier post on the subject. If you will look at the many photos of Portland public toilet , you will see possibilities of jamming the doors.
To your next point
, you obviously think that privacy is not important when one takes a dump? In the USA? C’mon! Is it privacy that leads to drug use? You ought to reveal this to those who are promoting the war on drugs. I could write volumes on this thinking but I won’t.The DeCaux toilet have sensors and telephone or internet contact to the maintenance people or the authorities. I don’t have a reference for this fact but I know it from my research years ago. If they are concerned about the drug users, assuming they take longer than ten minutes or if the prostitutes need more than ten minutes ( I am excluding you) then the standard toilet can sound an alarm, open the doors except when jammed, or call the local police. When I tell you this, I am giving more recognition to yours and the general public’s fears that it deserves.
Personally, I got off in one of the Paris toilets once and I was not with a prostitute. It may have been somewhat kinky but it was memorable and fun. I know you might want to more about it and other strange places but you’ll have to wait for the book. The point is: so what if someone has sex in a toilet? And : so what if the person wants to shoot up in a toilet? The toilets, that I know in Europe are clean and for the same reason there are clean needle programs, why shouldn’t they have a clean environment. If they overstay, the alarms can go off and the effectiveness of the alarms will equal or exceed the methods that Portland plans to employ. I could offer more examples that your puritan obsessions would not tolerate, but some are pretty gross.
Yes, Seattle’s units quickly got dirty. The units were designed to clean every use and Seattle turned off the rinse cycles to save money. That is a fact that you did not report. Seattle was not charging for their use and Seattle was not getting revenue from advertising to offset the costs. The did not run their program as JC Decaux does and JC Decaux is perhaps the most successful manufacturer, seller and maintainer of these toilets.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004425645_toilets20m.html
http://www.portlandonline.com/MAYOR/index.cfm?c=eeihj
http://www.americanrestroom.org/us/portland/index.htm
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nicolebrodeur/2008058612_brodeur18m.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/17/us/17toilets.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Seattle&st=cse&oref=slogin
There may be more, but I gotta eat.
Love, Dieter
09 Sep 2008 at 03:15 pm | #
Taste of Cincinnati and Octoberfest organizers rent tents, chairs, port-a-johns among other things.
Washington park is a high crime area and it is necessary to close restrooms after dark. It is necessary.
13 Sep 2008 at 09:00 am | #
Jason,
Regarding this statement…
“Quite a different philosophy than the corporate persons who took over Cincinnati’s premier public space, given away freely by City Hall politicians.”
It’s incorrect and you know it. You know that Fountain Square remains a public space renovated and managed by a private not-for-prof. (And 90% of the funds for renovation were private.) Management simply follows the guidelines set by the City - the same guidelines as before. So it has NOT been “taken over” or “given away freely”. So please stop lying. Every time you make these bogus statements it demonstrates your complete lack of moral fiber.
13 Sep 2008 at 10:01 am | #
Police officers have told petitioners they cannot collect signatures on Fountain Square because it is now privately owned, and you know it. They are wrong, but who will want to face arrest to argue with an ill-informed police officer? Workers on the Square, from the orange-shirted ambassadors to garage employees, on the Square level and below, all say that the garage and the Square are owned by 3CDC, and you know it.
So when the law, and when visible employees say one thing, that is a takeover, and you know it.
So please stop ignoring the reality of what’s happening. Every time you ignore the truth it demonstrates your total blindness towards what is happening in the center of our city.