Cork’s public toilet policy ‘is in the toilet’, council says

One city councilor said city officials were wedded to the idea of ​​providing public toilets on the scale of a “Rolls-Royce” or “Starship Enterprise” or nothing, and as a result, residents were losing the most basic of amenities — a network of accessible, clean and well-maintained public toilets throughout the city.

The comments were made during a debate on the “inadequate” public toilets that the council has installed in the central Marina Park plaza. The toilets are run for the council by the operator of an adjacent café. Their opening hours mirror those of the café.

Councillor Brian McCarthy, of the Solidarity party, said what had been done there was simply not enough, that a petition calling for improvements was handed to the mayor last year and that more toilets should be provided as part of a multi-million pound project to build the second phase of Marina Park and upgrade the Marina promenade.

He said Marina Park is a manifestation of a larger problem related to the lack of public toilets across the city.

Councillors agreed a public toilet policy in May 2021 with short-term, long-term and medium-term targets. This led to the reopening of public toilets in the North Main Street Shopping Centre in June 2021 and the opening of a new supervised toilet next to the council library on Grand Parade.

Toilets are also available at English Market, Bishopstown Park, Tramore Valley Park, Ballincollig Regional Park and Fitzgerald’s Park. However, several councillors said the city still does not have enough public toilets.

American Tourist

Mr McCarthy said: “We used to have more of them but every time there were problems with anti-social behaviour they were closed. How is that the right response when they are essential for every urban area?”

He recalled an elderly American tourist who peed himself in the city because he couldn’t find a public toilet in time.

“I have never felt so ashamed as when I heard what happened to him – that his dignity was stripped away because we do not provide this most basic service to people,” he said.

“Imagine the humiliation he felt and the confusion he felt in trying to find something that should be widely available in this country.”

“Rolls-Royce Standard”

Fine Gael councillor Des Cahill said city officials were insisting on providing a public toilet “of the calibre of a Rolls-Royce” or nothing.

“It’s probably one of the three things that people come up to me about and it’s something that could be easily fixed, but the management team is deeply convinced that they either have to make the Rolls-Royce of public toilets or not at all. And I think that’s the problem,” he said.

Social Democrat councillor Padraig Rice said Paris had an average of six public toilets per square kilometre, compared with 14 in Cork in the 1980s, but there are now far fewer.

Fianna Fáil councillor Sean Martin said most towns and villages in West Cork provided clean and well-maintained public toilets.

“They’re not all Rolls-Royces. The city has to come up with a new model or system that works. I think our public restroom policy is in the restroom. That’s where it is,” he said.

Independent councillor Ken O’Flynn said that if new public toilets are to be built it is vital they do not turn into “makeshift injecting centres”.