Geeky Girl Engineer

I am officially fed up with going into restrooms that have been obviously designed by men. Evidently the women of the world are going to need to take more drastic actions because this situation does not seem to be resolving itself as more women enter engineering, architecture, and construction. Building code covers a whole range of issues from structural to safety to just plain standardization. Clearly, proper female restroom design needs to be put into building code. Perhaps we also need a rule that just as all engineering designs must be certified by a Professional Engineer, all female restrooms deigns must be certified by a female, perhaps not a female engineer, but probably any female who has ever used a public restroom will do.

Men, yes I am aiming this post at men because honestly I find it very hard to believe that a woman would be capable of making such stupid design decisions for female restrooms. This is not to say a female is smarter than a male (that’s an argument for another day), but because any female who has used a public restrooms knows exactly that I am talking about and would not design it so stupidly. So men, I don’t know why you are so confused about what about what we do and don’t need in a restroom. I assume and hope that none of you have been in a restroom when the ladies are using it, but still I would think the things that we need and want would be pretty common sense. Perhaps I should not assume certain men to have common sense when it comes to the ladies though. This election season has taught me that there are men out there who think women have magical reproductive systems. Thus ladies, lady parts, and lady part business is clearly an utter mystery to some segment of the male population. Therefore, let me give you an education about what the ladies want and don’t want in a restroom. I promise there will be no discussion the lady parts of anything else that might make you squeamish.

1. Probably the biggest complaint that I and many other women have is the length of the stalls. Here is how it is fellas, ladies like to do their business in stalls. We don’t use the urinals. Not only do we like to use stalls, but we like to have doors on said stalls to give us some privacy. No problem, you say, we always give you stalls with doors. Well, yes, you do, but here’s the thing, evidently you have never used a toilet in a stall with a door because if you had, then you would understand that the stall needs to be long enough that we can close the dang door without standing on the toilet or straddling the toilet. Seriously, the stall should be long enough that we can stand in front of the toilet and close the door at the same time. If you can’t imagine what I am talking about, I invite you to go to nearest toilet and stand in front of it, facing away from it (like you might sit down or something on it). Now look at the distance your body takes up in front of the toilet. We need at least that much space between the toilet and the swing area of the door. Since the swing area of the door is put onto building plans, you already know that distance, so just add a proper distance between the toilet and swing area so that you can stand there. Simple right? Makes sense?
2. We need a coat hook or something like it on the back or the door or the side of the stall. You might be aware that many women carry purses. Sometimes we also carry jackets or backpacks or other items. We like to be able to hang them when we are in the stall, so we don’t have to put our stuff on the floor. See this stuff is really not complicated.
3. We need a small trash can inside each and every stall. Some restrooms have those neat trash can and toilet roll hangers that fit in the wall between two stalls. Those are just fine, just as long every stall has a trash can that can be reached from the privacy of that stall. I realize you may be confused as to why on earth we would need a trash can in each stall. Let me just say that at certain times of the month, we need to carry certain, shall we say feminine hygiene products, into the stall, and we like to dispose of, shall we say used feminine hygiene products, in the privacy of the stall. If you want further information please go ask your wife, mother, middle school health teacher, or the internet.
4. While I am sure it is obvious that the stall needs to have toilet paper in it, what does not always seem to be obvious is where to put it. To put it simply, 99.999% of women are not in fact contortionists, and I imagine even the 0.001% of women who are, don’t like to do contortions in order to reach the toilet paper. It should not hitting our leg. It should not be behind the toilet. It should be in an easy to reach location.
5. One more thing about the stalls. I can only presume that someone somewhere at some point created some calculation as to how many stalls would be necessary based on the planned traffic in the bathroom based on the design occupancy of the building. Whoever they were that came up with this calculation, they were wrong. I don’t care how smart they were and what kind of glorious calculus and statistics they used. They were wrong. If you don’t believe me, I invite you to go stand outside any women’s restroom at any sports or performing arts venue, airport, dance club, or any other place where you can find large groups of women. There will be a line. However outside the men’s room, there will be no line, or there will be a line 1/10 the size of the women’s room line. So whatever your calculation says, throw in a large safety factor, maybe upwards of 1.5. We will call it the female safety factor. It is a safety factor both from the traditional engineering standpoint of being conservative in design but also from the standpoint of you may be in danger if us females find out who is responsible for these horrible restroom designs that never seem to improve.
6. Enough talk about the stalls, now let’s discuss the sinks. In general, the time spent in the stall is the time limiting step in a women’s use of the restroom, so there does not need to be as many sinks as the stalls. However there should be an adequate number of sinks, and they should be placed such that traffic can easily flow to, away, and around them.
7. Staying with the sinks, optimally there should be one soap dispenser per sink, however, if needed, this number can be reduced to as low as one dispenser per two sinks, if and only if, the dispenser if placed between the two sinks that share it. I’ve been to too many restrooms where there were three sinks and two soap dispensers at either end. Let’s think about this. Where the heck is the person using the middle sink supposed to get her soap. While I suppose some people may wash their hands differently, I and everyone I know, wets their hands, then puts soap on their hands, lathers, then washes with water. If the soap is not near the sink, are we supposed to get the hands wet, walk around someone else, get soap, and return to our sink, all while dripping water from our wet hands? Common sense. That is is that is really needed here. Also, if the reason for this stupidity in restroom design is due to restroom designers not being the type that wash their hands after the restroom, then gross, and wash your dang hands.
8. Now that we have cleaned our hands, we need to dry them. Shocker. Similar to the sink discussion, there should be enough paper towel dispensers or hot air dryers, to keep traffic moving in the restroom. I don’t know the optimal number, but if there are ten sinks, then more than two towel dispensers would be a good idea.
9. Next, we are back to trash cans. Yes, I know, I already stated that we need trash cans in each stall, but we also need them outside the stalls. After we use paper towels to dry are hands, we need to throw the used towels away. This is where the trash can comes in. Sometimes, we have something else we might like to throw away, who knows, so trash cans are good. Also, to get into more detail, big trash cans are good, and trash cans that we don’t have to touch to open are really necessary for hygiene reasons.
10. The next item that is necessary is a baby changing area. However, I am not sexist; the men’s restroom should have this too. Daddies change diapers too nowadays. A space specially dedicated for changing babies is required.
11. Now let’s discuss furniture. We don’t need it. I don’t know what you fellas think we do in restrooms, but in general, we do our business, wash our hands, and get out. Sometimes, a lady might want to freshen her makeup or do other personal tasks. Sometimes, if we are with a friend, we might chat. In general though, we don’t use the restroom as a living room. We don’t need couches. We don’t get the vapors and need to use the restroom to have a lie down. However we keep finding restrooms with couches in them. My theory is that the couches are there because the restroom is being used as a storage location for the couch. Look if the restroom is huge, then fine put a couch there, and if some women has a use for it, she can use it. However if the restroom is huge, go poll all the women you know, most of us would vote for more stalls, not a couch. [See number 5]
12. Are you ready for advanced restroom design? I know you can handle it. For hygiene reasons, after you wash your hands, you should touch as little as possible. That is why some of the newer restrooms don’t have doors at the entrance, they just have a slightly torturous route from the opening to the restroom to provide privacy. These are great. If this is not possible, consider placing a trash can right by the door, that way we can open the door with a paper towel, then throw it away afterwards. Simple.

Edited to add the following three based on comments from others:

13. No pedestal sinks. They are pretty and all, but just as we have stuff to bring into the stalls, we will still have that same stuff when we leave the stalls. Where do we put said stuff if there are no counters?
14. Consider that humans are different heights. While toilets and sinks normally are at generally standard heights that does not always accommodate everyone, there is flexibility in the height of paper towel dispensers, hand dryers, mirrors, and a few other items. Try putting them at different heights, so short people can use the lower ones, and taller people can use the higher ones.
15. I have been informed from a couple of males, that I may have assumed too much when I said the bad female restroom design reflects ignorance or unthinking on the part of men. I stand by my statement that the problem is probably men because statistically speaking most engineers, architects, and contractors are men. However, I have been informed by men that male’s restrooms have just as bad design as the female’s restroom. I have also been informed that there are bad design of urinals. I know nothing about urinals, so I will not comment on how to improve them, other than to say that improved fluid dynamics design may be needed.

This has been your basic introduction to proper female restroom design. Please consider it carefully because if not, we are going start coming after those responsible for bad female restroom design. You have been warned. Women, was there anything I forgot? Please feel free to add to this in the comments. For further amusing discussion on what both women and men want in a restroom, please see this Storify Twitter discussion.