Barbican Centre plans to remove 18 women-only toilets as part of its Renewal project

[Imnobody4]

Saw this last night - info is a bit difficult to extract. Consultation end 2nd June.
Theresa Steele has written a thread. Sorry if you're not on X.

'The Barbican Centre plans to remove 18 women-only toilets as part of its Renewal project, replacing them with mixed-sex “universal” cubicles. This is not inclusion, it is erasure. There is still time to object (1/10)'

https://x.com/XXFemaleOnly/status/1927075027901399495?t=RMLBCTAHdWyeKkZlHoDayg&s=19

https://x.com/XXFemaleOnly/status/1927297439746179240?t=RMLBCTAHdWyeKkZlHoDayg&s=19

This is what
I finally find on Barbican site.
www.barbican.org.uk/exhibition-guides/barbican-renewal-may-2025-public-consultation
Inclusive design is non-negotiable: participants highlighted barriers in toilets, seating, lighting, signage and booking systems.
Suggestion: Non-gendered, family and accessible toilets were top priorities. Neurodiversity was thoughtfully raised with design suggestions for low-stimulation zones, choice-based environments and clear sensory cues.

Removing single-sex toilets means that there is sufficient space to meet the requirements as set out in the 2024 update to Part T of Schedule 1 to the Building Regulations 2010.

The objective of this requirement is to require toilet accommodation in non-residential buildings to be separate single-sex toilets, with single-sex shared or individual hand-washing facilities.
Universal toilets can be provided in addition to single-sex provision and where space allows. Where there is not sufficient space to provide single-sex toilets, fully enclosed universal toilets should be provided.

In the Secretary of State’s view, requirement T1 is met by ensuring all of the following.
a. Separate single-sex toilet facilities are provided. Universal toilets can be provided in addition to single-sex provision and where space allows. All toilet accommodation should have clear and appropriate signage.
b. Where space precludes single-sex toilet facilities from being provided, fully enclosed universal toilets should be provided. Available space for toilet accommodation will vary from building to building; once reasonable provision is made for single-sex toilet facilities, any remaining space for toilet accommodation can be considered for universal toilet provision.
[my emphasis]
Toilet accommodation: Approved Document T

The City of London board or whatever the body is apparently has form on this, eg see Hampstead women’s pond. They own the Barbican. There is apparently a powerful trans activist in the CoL establishment.

See point 4, it looks like Edward Lord was in charge of the consultation for the Barbican toilets and history suggests he’s not a fan of women’s SSS.

sex-matters.org/posts/updates/edward-lord/

This drives me mad and makes me sad at the same time. Why is every other special interest group’s needs met, except for women?

Women have special biological needs. Pregnancy, childbirth and menopause often impose additional requirements on females not shared by men necessitating greater numbers of loos and requiring longer visits. IBS is also more common in women. Please have mercy! Life is hard enough.

I saw an excellent piece of analysis - because of the way men use toilets, they often get urine on the seats - especially once the toilets are not completely clean so they (understandably)don’t want to lift the seat. Women have to either hover or sit down, so they often have to clean the seat before use.

Way to go Barbican, make all women visitors into de facto cleaners

Oh, the non binary eejit?

They are making a rod for their own back, imo.

I don't think toilets like this are necessarily a problem in themselves if there are enough for the number of users and they are kept clean, and the entrances are observed.

However it's going to reduce the possible number of toilets as these kinds of enclosed cubicles require more space, and each will be in use longer because of the self-contained sinks, and lack of urinals (if there is a lack of urinals.)

So it is going to be that much more costly, and use that much more space, to fit in an appropriate number of toilets.

Yes. And an arts venue is the worst possible place to implement this sort of design, because everyone wants to use the toilet in the same 15 minute window. They'd have to be absolutely fucking bonkers to change their toilet design in a way that makes that queue move more slowly.

Yes, @MissScarletInTheBallroom , and there is serious research into this stuff, who uses what loos for how long etc. It’s both ideological and opportunistic. Service providers have increasingly been thinking that it’s a way to make their lives easier, one facility, one lot of cleaning and maintenance.

I submitted my views and today I got an acknowledgement email.

I wonder if there’s a formula you could work it out? Average time in loo + washing hands versus time in loo then washing hands outside the cubicle. If 50% of the auditorium went to the loo, how many people would have to go back to the second half without then getting an icecream or drink because they had been queuing so long for the loo?

You can submit your views on the website, see link:

https://www.barbican.org.uk/exhibition-guides/barbican-renewal-may-2025-public-consultation

They temporarily did this at Xmas. I complained and a she/her replied to me with a load of lies about refurbishments in the men’s. I replied that this was lies and the she/her replied about how if this was a problem, any member of staff would be able to direct me to a gendered toilet to meet my needs. No mention regarding my comments that on the floor that I was sat on, there were no female only toilets but yet 2 sets of toilets for men to use.

Mind you, I wonder how much women's custom they lose for ice cream and drinks because we always have to queue longer than the men. Last time I was at a theatre with DH I suggested drinks in the interval, and he said, "OK, you get the drinks while I go to the loo." I said, "Er, no, I'm going to rush to the loo and beat the queue while you get the drinks - you can go after." And sure enough when I came out there was a massive queue for the ladies.

I think they’ll lose some drinks sales as women will be trying to avoid the loos.

I've emailed them to complain, heard nothing back. Here's the email address if you wish to complain too.

[email protected]

The Barbican have lost the plot.

Everyone knows fully enclosed unisex toilets encourage drug users because it's a perfectly enclosed space. London has no shortage of junkies.

Public toilets with gaps under the door were invented for safety reasons. You can't have mixed sex toilets with gaps in between because men can't be trusted around women with their knickers off!

It's basic public safety 101.

The main Barbican single sex loos are in the floor beneath the foyer from memory, are fully enclosed anyway (I think), basins outside and they are single sex. There is a bank of about twenty on one side for men and twenty on the other for women. The clientele are in the main older, many retired, for the concert hall at least. I don’t think this will land well with them at all, but hey, who cares about what your paying customers want when you have halos to shine and edgy reputations in arts management to promote?

London is a big city, are drug users in the loos an issue at the Barbican specifically? Clearly they are an issue in some spaces, but in others it won't be much of a factor.

The Barbican now? When will it end..I am so utterly fed up with this crap.

Anywhere that is private and sound resistant is handy for sex and drugs, like the universal cubicles. There was traces of cocaine found in over 90% of the Parliament loos, according to Sunday Times, though nothing was ever done about it.

So women will have 31 single sex toilets and
men will have 46 ( inc the urinals )
and

Women take 3 times longer to use a toilet !!!!! So women should have 3 times more. ie that makes it approx 19/ 20 for men and 58/ 57 for women. ( then we won’t see so many desperate women queuing for an entire interval )

Men are clearly still making all the decisions then I see.

Last time the Barbican tried this nonsense on they changed the male and female signage on the toilets to

• Toilets with urinals and
• Toilets without urinals

Thereby making all toilets available to men and those without urinals available to women. So women had lost their single sex toilet provision. I stopped going there at that point. Fed up with being treated like a second class citizen. If they don’t want to provide equality for women I think women should stand up for their rights in the only way that men and businesses feel the pinch. In the wallet

So fill out the forms but most of all
Boycott the Barbican and tell them why as they are determined, it seems, to shut us out.
If as many women as possible boycott the Barbican now the6 will see how it affects them before they make these decisions.

Women won’t have time to wait to use them anyway. They’ll be spending even more time queuing. That’s if they can even wait that long

Exactly

Surely this is sex discrimination, if someone brought a case against them the numbers game alone would surely mean there’s a strong case of success?