Public loos in LA are automated, deluxe -- if only they would flush
LOS ANGELES -- The green, oval, vaguely Art Deco pod arrived in Pershing Square six months ago -- billed as the answer to one of downtown's most human of needs.
It's a luxury automated toilet, the kind seen on the streets of world-class cities such as Paris and New York and a prototype for as many as 150 that officials plan to roll out across Los Angeles in the next few years.
Costing as much as a small downtown condo, it offers instructions in Vietnamese, French, Italian, Spanish, English, and Braille, advising passersby to drop a quarter in the slot and step inside.
Unfortunately, the bathroom doesn't work.
Six months after the arrival of the automated public toilet in Pershing Square -- and 2 1/2 years after officials began installing public toilets in the city -- only one of seven facilities actually works.
Though the luxury public toilet has become a status symbol in cities around the world, in Los Angeles it's a slightly complicated tale -- one of the city's efforts to create a more pedestrian-oriented life, but also a story about its bureaucratic struggles to achieve that.
The facilities are part of a 20-year contract between the city and a joint venture of two companies, CBS Outdoor and JCDecaux . The latter, a French company, has installed thousands of the sleek units worldwide, mostly in exchange for the right to sell the ads that adorn them. It's a common model that is used by the majority of American cities looking to install the loos. Los Angeles is guaranteed $150 million in revenue over the course of the contract.
But skeptics wonder whether the toilets are needed, and whether they are less about serving a public need than selling ad space.
"There is a price for it," said Kevin Fry of Scenic America, a nonprofit organization dedicated to scenic conservation. "The city streets become increasingly commercialized. . . . You are surrendering the visual quality of the public realm to marketers, and we don't think that's a way for cities to be built."
Even some supporters are becoming frustrated with all the delays. One downtown blogger has posted regular "Toilet Watch" updates on his website in frustration.
"If we want to clean up the smells and sights of our streets, we have to be able to offer these facilities," said Eric Richardson, the blogger, who is a member of the area's neighborhood council.
CBS Outdoor and JCDecaux are installing transit shelters, public kiosks, and toilets as part of a massive "coordinated street furniture" deal with the city. The companies foot the bill for installing all the structures, including the toilets, and for the maintenance on each. Separate city departments have been responsible for overseeing installation of the toilets , the running of sewer, power, water, and phone lines to the sites, and inspection and permitting of the toilets.
JCDecaux offers three stand-alone models: the Hydra, a gray, boxy structure that resembles a plastic storage bin; the Cox, a more streamlined version with a levered awning over the entrance that makes it look more like a bus shelter; and the premium, $300,000 Pillar, the oval, green version chosen for Los Angeles that has much in common with phone booths of yore. 