Lack of public toilets. (not Trans/GC related)

[youkiddingme]

Our local town has no public toilets. It has a market twice a week, a fair few shops, and is used by a lot of women and a lot of elderly people. We used to be able to use them in the town hall - but they are now roped off. We had a new bus station built not long ago and the council specified it must have no public toilets. Complaints are met with, 'we are not legally obliged to provide public toilets'. I really didn't know that. if you ask in the town you are told to go to one of the pubs, but as a lone disabled women going into a strange pub does not appeal, and what about women with children? I can't help wondering where all the people that are around town in the evening are weeing.

Got me googling and it looks like shutting loos altogether is quite a popular idea with councils. This is the most recent thing I could find with any figures and it's really depressing.

inews.co.uk/news/long-reads/uk-public-toilets-disappear-cuts/

I actually give up on this place when a mother who explains how hard it was to offer their sick female child privacy and hygiene on a long journey due to a lack of public facilities is told that it's probably all her fault anyway.

Long live feminism. Well done lassoffyvie.

It seems a bit retrograde to suggest that women and girls should revert to 19th century clothing rather than expect adequate facilities to meet our basic sanitary needs.

""You didn't explain it well at all. That doesn't suggest she was wearing it as a dress. Putting it on over her head, like a dress would have drawn less attention to her leaving the restaurant. " Yes I believe I've accepted I didn't explain it anyway, and given further explanation.

"You might want to consider putting her in skirts or dresses which won't show up accidents"

Utterly irrelevant. Why would I leave a urine infected piss-soaked skirt on my five year old to satisfy your bizarre ideas?

The council loos still open in my city are absolute stinking cesspits of graffiti, urine, shit, rubbish, and vandalism.

I can see why they are closing.
Any larger events have portaloos.

Lassosfyfe I'm not quite believing you wrote that. Give yourself a shake.

Tiresome "it was all her own fault because of what she was wearing klaxon.

Bloody hell, the tenacity with which some people cling to their quirks in the face of a distressed mother is remarkable.

For the hard of thinking, I was making a rueful joke about long skirts, not an actual sanitary suggestion. I've no idea why some people seem to think it could be an earnest suggestion.

Ancient, your clarification was fine, don't feel you have to jump through any more hoops. Your example experience was perfectly illustrative.

I don't think we should be encouraging any one just to whip their penis out and pee just because it's easy. But on the other hand a small girl in an emergency will find it far easier to emulate the ease a small boy can deal with this if she is wearing a skirt, rather than trousers. There's no need to have her bum on display and it is no more or less obvious than a small boy peeing.

I can think of another couple in Edinburgh actually, but they're not in the centre (top of middle meadow walk, Nicolson Square, Bruntsfield links). I don't think I'd use them though — some are down stairs, and they all look a bit dark and lonely. I'd go in the university instead I think if I were around that area. (Alumna, so I'm sure some of my tuition fee paid for those toilets. )

It isn't good though. Department stores, supermarkets and libraries are often the only places I'd go now. Or I'd buy something at a café — not that easy to do as a family though.

Pissoirs are not the way to go. In Belgium I saw men just urinating against the sides or even on the floor around them.

LassofFyvie do you have children? My DD was distressed by the idea of urinating in public - when she was smaller she was happy do so.

"There's no need to have her bum on display and it is no more or less obvious than a small boy peeing."

And yet explaining this to a distressed and sick child is hard. Neither of my daughters have been ok with peeing outdoors since about age 3.

Hence the emergency.

Please stop judging them.

outdoor peeing, is not that difficult for a girl or a woman if they are wearing a loose skirt.

Unless she's wearing tights to try to keep warm. Or wears trousers so she can have long johns under them for warmth, you can't do that with a skirt. Or doesn't wear skirts because she does the kind of job that requires trousers. Or isn't wearing a skirt because she's on her way to Go Ape or something similarly active. Or wears shorts under her skirt to prevent upskirting and thigh chafe. Or is in cycling shorts/running tights. Or is hiking and likes not have her legs bitten to death by ticks and mosquitos and so is wearing trousers. Or likes doing handstands and cartwheels and is wearing trousers so she can do those things without flashing her knickers. Or is in those rash leggings/sunblocking leggings that are great for summer kayaking and sea swimming. Or likes not having to worry about the wind (or floor-level ventilation that you find in offices and, according to our IT staff, some server rooms) blowing her skirt up.

Or simply does not like skirts or find them to be comfortable.

My point is that there are many reasons why a woman or girl might wish to wear trousers, tights, leggings, or shorts. She shouldn't be denied a safe and dignified loo because she didn't or couldn't wear a skirt that day.

In Belgium I saw men just urinating against the sides or even on the floor around them.

I was in Brussels one evening and the gents loos were open but the ladies and disabled were locked. Neither I nor the other women intending to pee could believe it.

Belgium is second only to Germany for shittiness to women.

The question is why is it only being spoken about in the public domain now?

My local town closed one set of men's/women's toilets in the early 80's.
And a seperate ladies toilets in the 90s.

The council did try to install a state of the art unisex loo tardis thing, in the middle of the precinct that nobody wanted to use!

I think it has been spoken of in the past, but perhaps social media allows us to see an overall picture more clearly?

We were on holiday in London not that long ago, and were shocked by the lack of toilets. Guess this is another effect of austerity politics.

I was about to say people should take a protest shit on the town hall steps but like many others we've lost our nearest town hall.
In January we are about to lose the bus, so no public transport for village, 3 miles down unpaved lanes to the nearest shops.
I suppose we could always take a shit in a hedge.

I am feeling very lucky to report that we have two sets of public toilets in our small town. Also, lots of pubs/bars/cafes do have 'use our loo' stickers in their windows.
Mind you, we are very near the coast and get a fair few visitors/holidaymakers.
And then I also remember that our council tax is ferociously high.

Just came back to say what is important on a thread like this is learning about the lived experience of others. So if you are managing your own or a child's health issue perhaps best to listen and wonder how we might deal with it, but not assume we know better.

Remember an occassion going out with my mother who had had to accept being in a wheel chair and being told by a mother with 2 small children my mother should wait while they used the disabled toilet as the queue for the ladies was too long. She was too old fashioned and polite not to object but it turned into a very distressing situation.

On a totally different point I remember reading a thread on facebook about shewees (portable female urinals) and just thought what's this all about. But a quick google shows there are any number of these, and maybe some women are now thinking the lack of public toilets means it might be better to have one just in case?!

I found this web site: pee.place/en it shows the location or rather lack of public toilets in the UK. It even covers other countries

But on the other hand a small girl in an emergency will find it far easier to emulate the ease a small boy can deal with this if she is wearing a skirt, rather than trousers.

I have had to wee in the garden when locked out as a child (had to wait in garden for parent to get home). As a child I was in school uniform, which was a skirt (summer, so a knee-length lightweight gathered thing). I had to juggle keeping my pants out the way with keeping my skirt out of the way, and not falling over or weeing on my feet. The best way was to pull the pants crotch forward, and the skirt forward and over to one side, so I could hold it with the other hand ie. my bum was out, just as much as it would be in trousers. The only advantage is that it's marginally easier to squat when you don't have trousers keeping your knees more together.

It's not as easy as you seem to think to wee in a skirt - they're not generally netted, tent-like affairs.

Not that any of this is the point.

They're closing them because they don't have the funds to clean them. Yet again, women suffer from austerity.

What I dont understand is that so many town centres are struggling to survive, so you would think one of the things that local businesses might do is get together and set up the scheme that happens in parts of London and elsewhere to say if you are shopping locally you are welcome to use our toilets.

Maybe a mumsnet campaign across smaller towns?

Shouldn't be that tourist towns are able to do this, but other towns aren't.

My dd won't wee in public. We went to the local woods with some friends. They had sons who all were fine going behind a bush but my dd wouldn't do it, despite being desperate. I had to take her home in the end. All the kids were around the same age - 3/4.

We are fortunate that in our town centre there is a shopping centre and a supermarket which both have toilets including a family/baby change one. There's no public toilet that I am aware of.

My dp has IBS and the urge to go to the toilet comes on very suddenly and unexpectedly. I can think of a view occasions that we have been out and had to go on a mad hunt around for a toilet for him. They are not always easy to find and public ones are definitely scarce.

Few*

We have a local park with a beautiful play area - but no loos at all. DD2 has continence issues - generally she can be OK for a period but then things will flare up and she'll be doubly reduced-continent for a while until we get medication readjusted. She's having one of those periods at the moment and while, when she was a toddler I'd just take a million changes of clothes and go in the baby change, now I can't do that easily so we've been confined to the house.