To my America friends, is there really a problem in your country with the lack of public free toilets? Why Is It Harder to Find Public Restrooms Near You in U.S. Cities? - Bloomberg 🚽

@Munish most retail establishments like McDonalds, Starbucks, malls, and gas stations now double up as public restrooms but since those are private business, they restrict who can use them so I can totally understand when a large portion of the population doesn’t have access to one.

@Munish let’s put it this way: Flush is a good app to have in your “travel” folder 😆

@pratik it’s America though. A massive superpower that has not spent the money, which is a surprise to me

@Munish we only like spending enormous public money on military and police. For the rest we expect “free” enterprise.

@Munish Things still continue to surprise me even though I’ve now spent 20+ years here

@Munish There totally is. In my smallish (~18k residents) there is currently a big controversy because the mayor wants to spend some of our pandemic relief funding to build public restrooms downtown, and a bunch of terrible people keep insisting that it’s a waste of money because only “homeless people and drug addicts” will use them.

@Munish there are public toilets in some of the train terminals.

@Munish As a Brit who has moved to the US, I would say 100% “YES,” there is a big problem with public toilets. No where near as available as in the UK.

@crossingthethreshold @Munish In the UK access to public restrooms was never appreciated by me. I realised the importance when we were in the full lockdown.

@toddgrotenhuis @pratik @Munish 🤣 … Sadly, it’s true! I don’t know where I heard or read this … In US, “skin time” between newborn baby and mother is charged per hour at the hospitals. I don’t know if this true or not but it blew my mind and made very sad. Long live our NHS!

@toddgrotenhuis I have used that app before. Many a moon ago. It does make me laugh, if you do a random search and see the lack of toilets. Shows the great divide

@pratik there was a time when England used to send £50m a year to india for toilets in Mumbai. There were only a handful that were built. This is India, the great super power.

@toddgrotenhuis the powers drive forward this

@khurtwilliams I do remember. I think compared to Europe the US struggles. We all have one problem or another.

@crossingthethreshold I noticed this in NYC. As a family holiday though, we just used hotels and coffee shops. But we had to spend to use. I was very confused when I went over ten years ago and every toilet was locked.

@ridwan wow. That cannot be true can it. The skin time.

@timapple Oh thanks for clarifying. I couldn’t believe it tbh! @Munish

@timapple On a separate note, I enjoy your posts from my military experiences on Listed.

@Munish And I guess a little uncomfortable as well?? I use to know someone involved with Phlush, a non-profit working for accessibility to public toilets.

@Munish I think the challenge in the large cities of the USA, e.g. New York City, is the sheer volume of people. It’s a known issue: www.curbed.com/2020/12/n…

@Munish @ridwan fake news on the skin time.

@khurtwilliams @Munish Good to hear that. 🙈

@ridwan @khurtwilliams lol