Paul Bass Photo
Portland’s celebrated loo.
The latest idea under consideration to relieve downtown stress: replace the above comfort station with something more like what you see on the right.
Andrew Wolf is looking for help, inside and outside city government, to bring four of those modern public bathrooms with flush toilets to spots around the center city and spiff them up with arts, local boosterism, and the sounds of the New Haven Symphony.
Wolf, New Haven’s arts and culture director, first broached the idea late last year of bringing attractive, modern-day public restrooms in place of rickety, dirty port-o-lets. The idea has gone through refinements since then (more about that later), with the help of City Engineer Giovanni Zinn. Now Wolf is seeking institutional sponsors — “naming rights!” — to foot the six-figure bill.
He said he hopes by next spring to unveil these “four major architectural statements for public convenience.” He envisions placing one outside the state court at Wall and Church Streets, another by Trinity Church, a third up Chapel Street near the art galleries, and a fourth at an as-yet-unidentified location. He said the city would work to regularly clean and monitor them.
A cultural mecca like downtown New Haven needs this convenience for local people and out-of-towners alike, Wolf argued. Public urination has been a problem downtown, and merchants are reluctant to open rest rooms to non-customers.
“We do have over a million visitors a year. Our merchants constantly ask us for help for visitors coming in and asking to use the bathroom,” Wolf said.
The restrooms would feature modern design, paid promotional messages for local attractions, and piped-in Symphony recordings.
Plus room for cyclists to wheel right in.
“You can’t have people bicycle into a city unless you give them rest rooms too,” Wolf reasoned, citing New Haven’s growing embrace of all things unmotorized-two-wheeled.
Chief Administrative Officer Mike Carter directed Engineer Zinn to explore the idea’s practicality.
Zinn confessed to some initial skepticism. Wolf’s initial idea was to bring in Parisian-designed self-flushing toilets marketed by a company called JCDecaux. Public toilets like this one pictured in San Francisco.
As a cursory Google search revealed to Zinn, these ballyhooed toilets were disasters. They broke. They stank.
Fancy public bathrooms sound great in theory, Zinn noted, but “it’s the little details that will make or break this kind of thing.” Especially the design details.
Then Zinn discovered the Portland, Oregon loo.
That city did its research, and came up with a stainless-steel box that addressed problems found in other cities’ versions. Billed as free “simple, sturdy, flush toilet kiosks located on sidewalks in public areas,” they open at the bottom. That means you can’t peep in, but cops can see how many feet are inside. (“The lower louvers are angled to provide law enforcement the opportunity to observe the number of users within the unit without compromising privacy,” states to official loo website.) The sink remains outside to shorten stays inside. The design is simple, utilitarian, easy to clean. No more automatic flush; they’re hooked up to city water, sewer and electricity.
The bathrooms have remained clean and safe, Zinn learned. Portland has patented the idea and partnered with a local firm Madden Fabrication to make and market the loo to other cities.
“It’s a 6,000 pound hunk of stainless steel,” Zinn said. “It’s tough stuff.”
If New Haven goes that route, each loo can be purchased and connected to utilities for about $130,000, Zinn estimated. That’s about half of what the original Parisian self-flushing models cost. (San Diego had to spend a lot more to put in Portland-style loos, but that’s because they weren’t located near utility connections, Zinn said. That won’t be a problem with the envisioned New Haven locations.)
Zinn, a solar-power enthusiast, discovered the loos need conventional electricity. He called around to other cities and learned that during prolonged snow storms, solar-powered loos can lose their electricity, and thus their heating, and pipes can freeze.
The loos remain in the proposal stage, as Wolf beats the institutional bushes to raise money for them.
Win Davis, executive director of the Downtown Special Services District, welcomed the idea of improving on the current port-o-lets on the Green. He’s heard complaints that they attract prostitution. They also don’t “send the right message” about downtown, he said. They get quite dirty and “abused.”
“One way or another we need to figure out a way to provide facilities for people downtown,” Davis said. “Port-o-lets are never a permanent solution. We can do better.”
To hear Wolf speak more at length about his loo mission during an appearance this week onWNHH radio’s “Dateline New Haven,” click on the above sound file, beginning at 45:20 into the program.