Tag: urinals

Charting the social acceptability of peeing in public

This is no laughing matter. It’s serious sociology people. Get with the program.

So, because you all need to think more deeply about your innate desire to pee in public, here’s a graph representing the social acceptability of said action (or other peeing related actions) and the outcomes of such pressure on your bladder. This social pressure creates real pressure.

From the artist/sociologist:

This was something I used to help me think through the two main axes that determine peeing behavior – biological and social control. Urination is a biological function that has been subjected to a great degree of social control. Unfortunately, urban design has not kept pace with the demand for clean, easily accessible public restrooms for humans. And there has been no attempt to create any kind of system to deal with canine urine. In most cities it is illegal for humans to pee in public but both legal and widely accepted for dogs to pee where ever they like (in New York, they cannot pee on the grass in parks).

Mind your pees and queues

When we stopped over in Singapore I noticed the urinals there had the old “fly on the wall” trick, designed to encourage better aim and reduce mess for the cleaning staff. It’s a beautiful nudge.

This one is better. It has nothing to do with “queues” except that less time cleaning means more time being used…

You can buy them to install at home. When the target (the dangling ball) gets a spray it changes colour. Clever stuff.

4U2P

Apparently urinating on walls is a massive social problem.

I had no idea. I did hear that Singapore (I think) had some laws about public urination that didn’t include lifts – so in protest people started urinating in lifts…

Anyway, it’s hardly an epidemic, at least in Australia. Apparently that’s not the case in Mexico. At least that’s the only reason I can think of to invent something like this.

What is this? You ask. This is a public and discrete urinal. As discrete as an oddly shaped bright yellow plastic sculpture can possibly be…