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Comment by lotsofpulp | Hacker News Reader

Infeasible for a government would mean it is sufficiently expensive that it is not politically popular to spend that much money on public bathrooms.

Also, Buc-ees does not offer free bathrooms in urban, dense areas with higher proportions of mentally ill and drug addicted populations, so that comparison makes no sense.

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I used Buc-ee's as an example because they're famous for their clean bathrooms. But there certainly exist clean bathrooms in urban areas. I'd venture to say that those aren't all in high-end establishments that exclude any "riff-raff". It's possible to find clean toilets in urban McDonald's or Wal-Mart; maybe not all of them, but certainly not none either.

And regarding expense on public bathrooms:

* San Francisco spent $1.7M on a single toilet

* Seattle spend $5 installing 5 toilets.

* NYC's public restrooms routinely cost $2M-$4M

Now, those are building projects rather than ongoing operations. But it shows that governments are willing to spend absurd amounts on toilets.

I don't know exactly what the problem is, but there's something about government (mis)management in the issue.

The problem is a small minority ruining the commons.

https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2026/08/vandals-set-fires-i...

Sure, but why is it that government-run institutions are (we're being told in this thread) uniquely vulnerable to the problem? Why isn't it happening at Buc-ee's or at McDonald's in the same degree?

Those places are staffed or closed between 10pm and 7am, dissuading vandals:

>The vandalism happened between about 10 p.m. on Aug. 21 and 7 a.m. the following day, according to officials.

But also, the lack of desire to spend money on staffing government restrooms in the first place.

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