You’ve already heard about it, you might have seen it, and you may even have smelled it: The Dolores Park pissoir has been attracting national news coverage — but did you know the city might be sued for it?
A Christian legal nonprofit based in Sacramento called the Pacific Justice Institute is zeroing in on the little corner of the park on 20th and Church to dole out some urinary justice. The group defends the rights of clients like pro-life pregnancy crisis centers and parents who oppose transgender kids using bathrooms that fit their gender identity. They are calling foul on the open-air urinal, not just because of its smell, but because it encourages people to expose themselves and because it’s discriminatory to women — given how unlikely it is that people with vaginas will choose that location to pop a squat when nature calls.
The letter sent by the group claims that the “Delores park” [sic] urinal violates users’ privacy and subjects them to “the shame and degradation of urinating in the public view,” a violation that is “particularly egregious for women and girls” because of “the unique way in which females urinate.”
The letter also cites a $15,000 cost to build the urinal (accurate, as it happens) and a bevy of complaints about the facility.
Hearing this, I recalled complaints from residents around the area who were plagued by people peeing on their doorways and garages and thought, ‘No way, people can’t possibly be upset that there is a place other than their front steps for people to relieve themselves?’ But it’s more complicated than that.
Some are totally pleased with the renovation and the pissoir.
“Well, it’s better than doing it here,” said Scot Webster. He’s happy with the new park too. “They’ve done a wonderful job, there’s been a lot of work done.”
“The pissoir is a better alternative than people pissing on my front steps,” said resident Juan Carlos Collins. “We need more pissoirs.”
But others are also not terribly thrilled about the sparse cover provided to shield urinators from innocent glances.
Several small vine plants have been installed around a stiff wire mesh guard that comes to just about chest height (at least on the three or so men I saw using the urinal from a distance). The plants are expected to grow up all over the fence, to block the public’s view of the men’s privates while they’re using the pissoir. They haven’t grown in yet, so a vinyl sheet has been hung around the inside of the barrier instead. That, said many homeowners, kinda doesn’t cut it, and they say the plans looked different from what was built.
“There was supposed to be a kind of structure that was this high ” said Alvaro Bravo, gesturing to roughly the height of his head. He owns a house overlooking the Church side of the park. “That thing right now is disgusting.”
Bravo also noted that the number of bathrooms in the park overall has climbed to 47, and doubted that one more urinal would deter people too lazy to walk to the bathroom from peeing on walls.
“If 47 are not enough, 48 are not enough,” he said.
“I find the design very poor, and the location unadapted. European cities used to have them but they have been removed since decades, probably because they were too smelly and difficult to maintain,” said Sergio Uranga, also a Church Street resident. “I hope this pissoir will be removed.”
Doug DuFrene, on 20th Street, said he once went into his garage to find a mat under his car completely soaked in urine.
“It smelled like a whole line of people had gone there,” he said. So giving people an alternate place to go made sense, he said.
“I was all in favor of this,” he said. But, he added, “It should be camouflaged.”
As for the lawsuit? Many residents hadn’t heard about it, some agreed that it’s hard to argue that it discriminates against people who need to squat to urinate, and others found it laughable.
“There’s no need to take it to court. Someone just needs to say this is a bad idea and fix it,” Bravo said.
“It seems a little bit like a crazy idea, but I haven’t been disrupted by it in any way,” said Faye Hipsman, another 20th Street resident. “A suit seems like overkill to me.”
Indeed, pissoir or no, freely urinating men are no uncommon sight at the park.
“Just walking through the park, you see a dozen guys peeing” said Craig Parton, a seven-year area resident, in reference to an area along the J-Church light rail line that Bravo also said attracted many a lazy urinator. “There’s a lot of penises flying around on busy days,” Parton acknowledged, because the bathrooms are still far enough away that some simply choose the wall or a tree.
For its part, the Recreation and Parks Department has declined to comment specifically on the potential court case, referring instead to the City Attorney’s blanket statement that it will “give their legal theories all the consideration they deserve.”
The Pacific Justice Institute did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether it still intends to pursue the suit.
I very much approve of this pragmatic urbanism.
Its is a tight rope act because the more you enclose it and make it private, the more likely it is to used for shooting up or other illegal activites, and the more likely it presents a dangerous environment to someone using it… witness the recent mugging at the Mission Bart station toilet, for example.
Do they plan to sue France and the Netherlands as well? Pissoirs are a long-standing (no pun intended) fixture in Europe, and nobody thinks twice about using them… except, possibly, offended American tourists.
“Urinary justice” FTW