Idea #7: What Community Toilet Scheme?

Another day, and another council announces it might close some public toilets and pay businesses to let the public use theirs instead (Tendring Council, in case you’re keeping score).

Not necessarily a bad thing. 10 public toilets can become 100 community toilets for the same price. But whilst public toilets are visible in the street, recognisable, and permanent; community toilets are hidden within businesses, not well understood by the public, and the participants frequently change.

So how do you communicate a Community Toilet Scheme?

There’s the slightly inadequate sticker in the window, which you have to know to look for and which some shops are reluctant to display.

Other than that you’ve got three options: Signposts – today’s topic, Maps – tomorrow’s topic, maybe…, and Apps – see ‘Open Data’ – a whole other topic! *dramatic sigh*

… Crime

I’ve just gone through our 100 user interviews about public toilets from the research stage of TACT3 and found 59 references relating to Crime or Fear of Crime, from 29 different people.

This was not just for kicks, but because we have a new 6 month research project looking at Public Toilets and Crime.

It’ll come as no surprise that people associate one with the other, and for good reason. There’s plenty of evidence of crime being committed in public toilets and therefore every need to research the reasons why and consequently Design out Crime.

And as well as a fear of crime, I have a fear of design.  A fear that some design interventions that aim to design out crime may disadvantage the general public. One example that I’ve heard a few times is that providers avoid heating public toilets in order to discourage people from ‘hanging around’. Brrr!

Idea #1: Fingerposts

This idea for improved pedestrian signs doesn’t just show which direction the toilets are in.

They tell the person which facilities are provided, how far they are and how accessible they are.

Would this be useful to you?

Should this information be included on existing signs?

or is it too much detail, unnecessary confusion and expense?

Please vote as to whether I should keep working on it, and leave any thoughts (comments, criticisms, ideas, Anything!) in the comments below. They’re vital to developing better loos for all!