On Wednesday, February 2 at 11 a.m., BART will hold a toilet paper cutting event to mark the reopening of the Powell Street Station restrooms that have been closed for more than 20 years.
Restrooms at 10 of BART’s underground stations have been closed since September 11, 2001 because of safety concerns. Powell Street Station’s two public restrooms are the first to reopen.
The two restrooms are all-gender with LED lighting. The touchless sink is located outside of the restroom on the concourse making it easily accessible for those who just want to wash their hands. There is also a drinking fountain and water bottle filling station.
The restrooms will be staffed for at least the first two months to promote proper use of the space and offer staff presence. BART is bringing in community members from the Oakland-based organization District Works to serve as attendants.
35 comments
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… a new heroine den! I’m sure the addicts will appreciate it.
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I’ve never seen a BART bathroom that clean. I hope it stays nice. They usually look worse that CBGBs or the movie Trainspotting. I wonder how long it will stay pristine. Next year it will likely have constant flickering lights, strange and noxious smells, wet toilet paper all over the place, always a wet floor, wet seats, very clogged toilets, and a six figure salary janitor not cleaning it.
Only in California do you need to teach people how to properly use the restroom. 🤪
Touchless sink, perhaps, but the seating arrangements are an entirely different matter.
On your mark, get set…You have 1 day before it’s unusable because it’s been trashed beyond all comprehension.
Just hold your nose and name it Covid Central
and rename Bart.. Transient Transit.
How are the safety concerns of 2001 lessened now? If anything, they are worse. This is pure bureaucratic virtue signaling – after all, a bathroom for ‘all genders’ is just so progressive.
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Why only staff it for two months? It wouldn’t coast much to keep on a full time attendant, they work for tips. They maintain and keep the facilities clean, and ensure that toilet paper, soap, paper towels, and other necessary items are kept stocked. An attendant can be a deterrent to crime, and help to ensure people’s safety. They can look after anybody that might be feeling unwell, and call the proper authorities is necessary.
@Dawg – What planet are you on?
@ OverWhelmed–I was being facetious.
What could possibly go wrong?
All-gender? Count me in!
In 24 hours it will look like a public latrine in Calcutta.
BART will hold a toilet paper cutting event, Why? What a waste of time and toilet paper!
I was thinking that a cheese cutting event might be more appropriate in a restroom
They should rename it either a homeless lounge or shooting den.
Wait…. What…..
Isn’t there a T.P. Shortage????????
Just add it to the list of BART’s Waste, Waste, Waste……
Wouldn’t it be nice if they used that money to hire actual police who are allowed to actually perform police duties!
Bart can afford a restroom attendant in each restroom. They can even brush off your coat as you leave or hand you a towel after you wash your hands. Wouldn’t that be a nice job for an out of work person.
What time will the cheese cutting begin?
Before any celebration let’s report back in 6 weeks…
I sure hope they pay those staffers well because they are gonna see some nightmare-worthy nasty activities.
…BART is bringing in community members from the Oakland-based organization District Works to serve as attendants….
We need to follow the money here and see which BART executive has family members employed by this organization.
I have marked my calendar. I am hoping to incorporate some of their ideas such as a sink in the hallway if I remodel my bathroom next year.
First of all it was ridiculous that Bart did not have restrooms for years. I would always hear Taurus and foreign visitors astonished that there were no bathrooms to use.
Secondly, as indicated above I’m sure these bathrooms are going to be full of drug addicts
It won’t be safe for any decent person to go into. We have to start getting tough on these vagrants and all their supposed rights while the rest of us suffer.
Homeless people will take over as soon as they can!
And people tell me Bart isn’t the joke around.
Just wait
These will last how long?
LOL, it’s safer to relieve yourself on the street.
Probably cleaner too.
Why waste money on rest rooms when people will do there business on the platforms and on the trains, the higher ups need to get a reality check of what really goes on, to put it bluntly it going to be a real $#@t show
BART will soon face lawsuits for discrimination against non-gender people. Meanwhile I’m the heroin addicts will find a new home.
The restrooms will be staffed for at least the first two months to promote proper use of the space and offer staff presence. BART is bringing in community members from the Oakland-based organization District Works to serve as attendants.
Now THAT’s a crappy job.
yeah thats going to be a baaaad idea. crazy ass homeless me going into the same place women go into. count me out of this dumb society
So attendants will be be paid a considerable salary to do absolutely NOTHING when transients and junkies trash the bathroom.
As another noted it is preposterous that BART did not offer public restrooms in all stations, this is unironically a step forward but it’ll be trashed in short order.
Still, a filthy, disgusting bathroom is better than no bathroom, when you’re in need.
It worked!! They closed the BART bathrooms to fight terrorism and it actually worked
As this facility is in San Francisco will the attendant be able to help me with the appropriate response to queries such as someone asking me “are you good from behind?” as I enter the facility?
My first BART excursion was truly unforgettable. I waited a couple of years before testing it out myself, hoping they’d have most of the the kinks ironed out by then. I had nowhere to go, but I was satisfying my curiosity. I was one of the few people left in the Bay Area who hadn’t been in a BART train. I entered and exited through the Concord station, and I took the train from Concord to Pleasant Hill and back. After my train ride I had planned to check out the station’s bathroom. I found a door with a bathroom symbol on it, tried it and found it locked. So I thought to myself “Okay, someone’s inside, or I must first obtain a bathroom key from a Station Agent. That would be weird, but okay”. After a while no one exited, so I went to the Station Agent’s booth and politely asked for the key to the bathroom. She said “No, I can’t give you the key”. When I asked why not, she answered that the BART bathrooms were not for the public, and they didn’t have public restrooms. I think my mouth must’ve dropped. She explained that they’d never been meant for the public, and she was not allowed to give her key to anyone. I asked “Even if it’s an emergency?” She said “Yes. Even if it’s an emergency”. When I asked who were the BART bathrooms for, she said they were only for BART and some other service employees, and that everyone permitted to use the bathrooms had a key, and they weren’t allowed to share them with anyone. A few years later in the 1980s I commuted on BART, and throughout my time commuting I could see that what she had told me was true. Everyone who used BART at the time knew that there were no bathrooms available to the public, no matter what! That the BART bathrooms originally were never open to the public, nor were they ever designed to be was one of my life’s biggest surprises. Not that I would ever have used one, but learning that they had designed the whole BART system from scratch with never an intention to make a single bathroom available for public use still blows my mind. I’m sure it must sound as nonsensical now as it did when I first heard it.
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