Hacker News Reader

Comment by cgcardona | Hacker News Reader

I live and work in San Francisco and have tweeted many times about the extreme lack of public restrooms and the overwhelming amount of human waste littered across our beautiful city.

We have an incredibly large transient population and yet there are hardly any public restrooms. It's an all too common site to see someone squatting down in the middle of the sidewalk relieving themselves.

We pride ourselves on being the Florence of the Digital Renaissance yet we can't provide for the basic human needs of our citizens.

For a while I've been looking for ways that I can make a big difference in cleaning up our city and this project is the catalyst that I've been looking for.

This morning my mind is on fire w/ ideas thanks to the inspiration provided by http://www.lavamae.org/.

As a person which has adopted San Francisco as my city and the place where I'm raising my son I thank you greatly!

:-]

[EDIT]

* Fixed broken URL

View on HN

It's worth reading this article: http://www.thebolditalic.com/articles/3758-why-is-there-so-m...

Homeless people were using the BART escalators as restrooms at night... causing them to break down. The solution? Multi-million dollar covers to stop people getting down there at night – not a considerably smaller sum for public restrooms.

This speaks to the psychology. There is still a population in SF that believes homelessness is a choice. And that facilities encourage homelessness. There is another segment that believes SF already shoulders a disproportionate amount of dealing homelessness. There are a lot of people that just find them annoying.

I'm always surprised how many locals don't believe Civic or Tenderloin is ever going to change. Why? Zoning, regulations – but mostly because it's always been that way.

So, yeah. I don't quite understand it either.

Just gate off the street entrances to the BART stations along Market Street and in the Mission. Problem solved.

I would really (ideally) like the urban BART stations to have restrooms, but unless the authorities are going to make sure they are clean, safe and sanitary, that's not going to work.

The restrooms in the downtown SF BART stations were open to the public before 9/11. They were closed and never reopened.

Civic or Tenderloin is ever going to change. Why?

Because the city and the electorate lack the will to deal with the problem vs doing little feel-good things that dance around the edges.

I think this is a simplification of the problem. I don't think (yes I'm one that thinks most are by choice) is a problem can be solved easily if not at all.

The current solution is put a "Twitter" in a bad area and construct new buildings around. So far seems is working.

I can say that people here are the most friendly ever seen so far (I'm european and I traveled a lot Europe, can't say about others places in the us).

So, I fatigue to think that San Franciscans are "bad" and they left most behind.

IMHO part of the problem is an heritage of and old lifestyle (especially with drugs).

What really upset me a bit is that here these people have no social care for their mental issues. Some are quite dangerous and I got really scared few times when I lived in tenderloin.

Not sure I follow. You're calling this a simplification, but your synopsis isn't that much more complex.

Plus, you think that most are by choice. However, you also point out lack of support for mental issues. I personally find this a contradiction – if you've got serious mental issues and no support, then the ability to choose is basically void.

See, they choose to be homeless in San Francisco. They could have chosen to be homeless elsewhere.

Homeless tend to flock to where it's easiest to be homeless. Definitely seen this where I live, over the past 10 years the city has devoted considerable resources to "homelessness" and during the same interval our homeless population has exploded. Used to be able to walk around downtown and never be bothered, now panhandlers are everywhere and even assault and robbery (previously almost unheard of) are more regular.

Public restrooms have a long history of challenges. Some cities take those challenges on, and some don't.

Things that I've noted as challenges (unordered) are; gang tagging/claiming, people sleeping in them, cleaning them, equipment damage, supplies (toilet paper, hand drying), and water wastage.

I wonder sometimes if squat toilets are a better solution for public restrooms with a varied population. Given they are pretty straight forward to clean from a distance with a hose.

Americans are probably too fat on average for squat toilets to be a feasible solution.

Not homeless Americans (though that's just an impression - IU'm not aware of statistics).

Also, I think squat toilets might actually work well for fat people anyway.

Didn't bart used to have restrooms on every station until 9/11 ?

Anyways, Palo Alto has a bunch of public ones and all of them are damn gross. Worse than civic center plaza. I wonder how hard (expensive) is it to keep them clean.

Even BART elevators (at least in the urban core) are nasty and practically toilets. Just try taking the elevator at Oakland Coliseum or Civic Center. There needs to be strict policing of public accommodations (and I use the term policing in a generic sense), but the political will to do so isn't here in the Bay Area. Just look at the freakout over homeless people squatting in the downtown BART stations.

Really? Hardly any? I would consider it rude not to offer free restroom in a shopping centre, although it's far too common in a fast-food joint (they aren't really any better than the ones that are truly public.)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com