San Francisco Public Toilets at $28.50 a Flush

EconomicPolicyJournal.com ^ | December 5, 2019 | Robert Wenzel

[PPSman]

Welcome to the People's Republic of San Francisco, where socialist planning is always expensive.

San Francisco officials have declared the recent test run of keeping the city’s Pit Stop public toilets open all night a success. The cost to the city is about $28.50 per flush and the city doesn't even wipe your butt for you at that price.

[null and void]

$28.50 per flush and the city doesn't even wipe your butt for you at that price.

They pay the homeless to take a dump?

[BBQToadRibs]

Any bets on how long until they become a homeless hangout for shooting up?

[Jolla]

They shoot up on the streets for all to see.

[shelterguy]

I remember a poem on the wall of a pay toilet years ago.

Here I sit brokenhearted
Paid a dime and only farted

[moovova]

Now, if they could only convince the homeless to use the toilets...and not the sidewalk.

[moovova]

Another favorite...from a favorite local bar’s men’s room:

Be like your dad, not like your sis...
Raise the lid, before you piss.

[Tennessee Nana]

When I was a child the ladies toilets cost 1 penny...the mens was free...

women would hold the door open for the next lady...

[G Larry]

That's CHEAP!

In Denver store owner have to clean up human poop at their own expense.

Specialty services charge $350 PER PILE to remove it.

[dfwgator]

Our aim is to keep this bathroom clean
Your aim will help

[null and void]

Hmmmm, can poop be commercialized? I recall hearing a story from during the Korean War that local merchants were bidding on the latrine servicing contract for a US base.

The GI that witnessed the auction was puzzled, as the price kept going up.

He found out that they were PAYING for the contents of the latrines! 'Night soil' was a valuable commode-ity (SWIDT?) and American poop was highly regarded as a better fertilizer than the local product.

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

Honestly, the idea of public toilets being open all night seems like a good one. The major cost here is that they have two attendants on duty at night to ensure they stay clean and safe. So if you need to have toilets open all night so the homeless don't poop on the sidewalk...sure. I wouldn't complain about my tax dollars going to that if I lived there.

But the problem seems to be that they still aren't using the toilets, and the toilets barely made a dent in the real problem:

[Though] there was a reduction in demand for [sidewalk] cleanups, that reduction doesn’t appear to be all that great....In the quarter-mile radius around the Tenderloin Pit Stop, calls [for sidewalk cleanups] went from 188 in the three months prior to the test to 176 during the three-month test — that’s a drop of four calls per month.

Calls for cleanups in the quarter-mile radius around South of Market Pit Stop dropped to 166 from 190 — eight fewer per month. Calls in the quarter-mile around the Castro Pit Stop dropped from 68 to 61, less than three per month.

So...the problem isn't the lack of toilets.

[bigbob]

How about baggies like for dogs? Since they act like animals...

[bgill]

They could always hang out in Starbucks where it’s warm and the toilets are relatively clean.

[PGalt]

ESAD overlords

[mistfree]

“I remember a poem on the wall of a pay toilet years ago.

Here I sit brokenhearted
Paid a dime and only farted”

waited three hours, finally started.
Then I wished I’d only farted.

There finished it for you.

[chief lee runamok]

"Staffing is the primary cost. The attendants ensure the public bathrooms are kept safe, clean and used for their intended purpose. History has shown that without attendants, public toilets in some of San Francisco’s most challenging neighborhoods are used for drug activity and prostitution, and become targets of vandalism...Two-member teams staffed the toilets during the overnight hours. Just one attendant staffs them the rest of the time."

24/7 full time guards on duty in a crapper.

The hoser attendant most necessary.

[shelterguy]

In Smokey and the Bandit Sally Field asked Burt Reynolds for a dime for the crapper. He told her to crawl under the door.

Good times.

[pingman]

It may just be poop to you, butt it’s someone else’s bread and butter!

[Da Coyote]

The homeless are wiping their butts on our wallets.
Oh, and they’re still not actually wiping their butts.
Democrats and homeless. The only diff is that I do have some feelings for the homeless.