14 DAY TRIAL // Not to play Captain Obvious, but the fact of the matter is that it's very much true that what they say that when you gotta go you, well, gotta go. Apparently, officials in Australia are very much aware of this simple truth.
Hence their decision to install several public urinals that they hope will keep folks who simply cannot hold it in any longer from relieving themselves in alleyways or, even more disturbing, in front of local businesses.
The thing is that, rather than being congratulated for their idea of theirs, the officials who ordered that public urinals be installed in Surfers Paradise, a suburb included in the Gold Coast City area in Queensland, are now being poked fun at and even heavily criticized.
Mind you, it really isn't very difficult to figure out why this is the case. Just have a look at the photos accompanying this article for the answer to this riddle.
Possibly the worst public urinals ever
By the looks of it, plenty of people currently living in Australia’s Surfers Paradise suburb find the installations not just ugly, but downright offensive. Truth be told, they kind of are.
Thus, as shown in the images shared with the online community, the urinals are basically fairly big blocks that have loos attached to them. The blocks are designed such that three men can relieve themselves at the same time while standing next to each other.
The biggest problem is that, as one can easily notice, these urinals offer no privacy whatsoever. On the contrary, passers-by can stare deep in the eyes of the people using the loos, and the latter can stare back.
What's more, word has is that, precisely because they have no walls or doors or anything of the sorts, the installations stink up the entire neighborhood. Besides, many doubt that they offer great sanitary conditions.
So, why were these urinals they installed?
Officials in Australia claim that the chief reason they saw fit to invest an impressive $5,500 (some €4,500) in adding these public loos to the local landscape in Surfers Paraside was that plenty of folks in the area like to get drunk and then relieve themselves wherever, whenever.
Thus, they say that the best solution for this problem that they could come up was to offer people an option to the alleyways and pavements they like to turn into their own, personal urinals whenever they get inebriated.
“We cannot arrest such people – we don’t have the power, so the thought was if we put urinals in places where the inebriated people have to stagger past, they may well use them. When people are staggering from nightclubs, they won’t seek out public toilets – even if they are there.”
“We’ve had drunk people urinating in shop fronts, on windows and all over footpaths for a long time now. It’s a seasonal issue for us, obviously becoming worse during this time of year. I don’t like the urinals either but they are less offensive than the alternative,” says councillor Lex Bell.
According to Oddity Central, the urinals were installed this past December 19. They were supposed to remain in place for a trial period of three months, but given people's reaction to them, it looks like they will be taken down shortly after New Year's.
Talking to the press, officials explained that one other option would be to try and fit them with bigger shields that would cover the people using them entirely. True, this would help ensure some privacy, but chances are that the unpleasant smell would linger.
