Stinky bus station

[lilpup]

not a surprise, really

http://www.freep.com/article/2010112...-room-problems

If the reporter or Mr. Henderson are reading please note with regard to the article's closing quote - in Michigan it is illegal to offer restrooms to the public without at least one stall being free of charge. You could follow up on that person's allegation.

[pffft]

I'm a little baffled by the "some even use the restroom to wash their cats" detail. How many homeless people have cats?

And if you're homeless and hungry, how important is it to bathe an animal that, famously, bathes itself every day?

[DetroitPole]

This is classic Detroit. We can't even operate a shiny bus station that we tore down a city block to build. So rather than make it functional, we're just going to change its name so it can keep being shitty. Hey assholes, this isn't GM Bankruptcy restructuring, it's cleaning the toilets at a bus depot - it shouldn't be hard to manage. How about the dispshits on council use their personal staffers who make six figures to clean it? Or can I earmark some of my exorbidant tax dollars for a guy with a mop at the bus depot?

$22.5 million for that pile of garbage. Oh yeah, Gary, you know what is really an insult to Rosa Parks? Detroit City Council for the past 30 years.

So what is with these make-work Clean Downtown guys who will sweep in one spot for 8 hours? What about all the cops at Tigers games? You know, the six officers it requires to get people accross Woodward from the Fox to Comerica Park! We can't possibly redeploy out personnel in a strategic way to restock toilet paper? How about the fatties in the City County building? There's hundreds of them and they could probably do something besides play solitare all day and screw up my property records. A little manual labor would do them good.

[Gannon]

Well, we could rename it for the special influence the Kilpatrick family bestowed upon the city. Extraordinaire eau de toilette.

[Bella]

I am still floored that $22.5 mil was put into this thing instead of allocating the funds elsewhere. Ya know, like schools.

I don't get the cat thing, either. Maybe they mean p*ssy. ugh, I hate that word.

I wish there was a way to give people points for the posts I read on this forum.

[bailey]

This is classic Detroit. We can't even operate a shiny bus station that we tore down a city block to build. So rather than make it functional, we're just going to change its name so it can keep being shitty. Hey assholes, this isn't GM Bankruptcy restructuring, it's cleaning the toilets at a bus depot - it shouldn't be hard to manage. How about the dispshits on council use their personal staffers who make six figures to clean it? Or can I earmark some of my exorbidant tax dollars for a guy with a mop at the bus depot?

$22.5 million for that pile of garbage. Oh yeah, Gary, you know what is really an insult to Rosa Parks? Detroit City Council for the past 30 years.

So what is with these make-work Clean Downtown guys who will sweep in one spot for 8 hours? What about all the cops at Tigers games? You know, the six officers it requires to get people accross Woodward from the Fox to Comerica Park! We can't possibly redeploy out personnel in a strategic way to restock toilet paper? How about the fatties in the City County building? There's hundreds of them and they could probably do something besides play solitare all day and screw up my property records. A little manual labor would do them good.

Just a little clarification for your rant.... the "Clean Downtown" folks are not city employees..and I would guess have no responsibility to clean the DDOT's facility.

The Clean Downtown team also maintains landscaping in public areas and provides support to many of downtown Detroit’s largest public events, festivals and sporting events.
This privately-funded program is staffed by workers from Goodwill Industries of Greater Detroit who bring pride and enthusiasm to their jobs of keeping downtown Detroit looking its best.

But really I think your ire is directed at the wrong people. Cops mopping floors? c'mon. How about direct some of that anger to the clear lack of access control? bar the homeless and the crazies from entry, problem solved. apparently all that takes is a metal detector.

Anthony Kelley, 42, who also is homeless, said the problem will worsen until the city provides better options.
"There aren't any places to go to the bathroom," Kelley said. "Some places charge money. We can't afford that."

and Detroit can't afford to clean up after you. Go to a shelter. Get out of downtown. Get treatment. Work for Goodwill industries.

[iheartthed]

How about direct some of that anger to the clear lack of access control? bar the homeless and the crazies from entry, problem solved. apparently all that takes is a metal detector.

You can't deny someone access to a public facility.

[Russix]

How many stalls does the men's or women's restroom have? Please don't tell me their's only one or two for a facility that handles more people than a highway rest area.

[bailey]

You can't deny someone access to a public facility.

you can make them go through security. per that article that is keeping them out of CAYMAC

[Russix]

you can make them go through security. per that article that is keeping them out of CAYMAC

Yes, this will be many times cheaper than paying to actually keep the place clean.

[Detroitnerd]

Now laughing at last year's argument with Hudinka, who made fun of me for not liking the design of the transit center. Hud had said: "Afterall, would you rather wait for a bus in a dark, noisy, smelly, polluted garage or a light, open, breezy plaza"

[DetroitPole]

Just a little clarification for your rant.... the "Clean Downtown" folks are not city employees..and I would guess have no responsibility to clean the DDOT's facility.
But really I think your ire is directed at the wrong people. Cops mopping floors? c'mon. How about direct some of that anger to the clear lack of access control? bar the homeless and the crazies from entry, problem solved. apparently all that takes is a metal detector.

and Detroit can't afford to clean up after you. Go to a shelter. Get out of downtown. Get treatment. Work for Goodwill industries.

I mean cops there for public safety, what with all the drug slinging and other mischief.

I'm just trying to illustrate that in a city where an incalculable amount of money is squandered or lost to corruption, and a city of 900,000 tax-payers, that there IS, not should be, money somewhere to pay a guy with a mop and a rent-a-cop at a brand new multi-million dollar transit facility.

How do you bar the homeless who ride the buses? What about the resident bus riders or general public who may outwardly seem homeless(i.e. stinky, weird, shabby - ever ride DDOT? That's a lot of people)? How do we selectively bar people from a public restroom(which is illegal)? A metal detector does not detect crazy or someone who is going to poop on the walls or homelessness, by the way - it detects metal. It seems your plan is one that needs clarification.

[kraig]

Don't be fooled. Clean Downtown is funded by Detroit taxpayers.

[bailey]

I mean cops there for public safety, what with all the drug slinging and other mischief.

I'm just trying to illustrate that in a city where an incalculable amount of money is squandered or lost to corruption, and a city of 900,000 tax-payers, that there IS, not should be, money somewhere to pay a guy with a mop and a rent-a-cop at a brand new multi-million dollar transit facility.

How do you bar the homeless who ride the buses? What about the resident bus riders or general public who may outwardly seem homeless(i.e. stinky, weird, shabby - ever ride DDOT? That's a lot of people)? How do we selectively bar people from a public restroom(which is illegal)? A metal detector does not detect crazy or someone who is going to poop on the walls or homelessness, by the way - it detects metal. It seems your plan is one that needs clarification.

well, per the article, Mr homelessguy seems to be saying that the metal detectors and security make it a hassle to use the restrooms at CAYMAC, so they don't . They go to the bus station where there is no one there to bother them. make it a bit more difficult to get in and you've eliminated part of the problem at least.

[NorthofNormal]

bar the homeless and the crazies from entry, problem solved

Head on over to the thread on the Corktown beating/dragging case to see some of the effects of barring the homeless from bathroom facilities. It sounds like a fair number of problems would be solved if the soup kitchen over there kept the potties open all day. Everybody poops--even the homeless and crazy. If you don't give them a flushable place to do it, they'll find someplace else. I'm with DetroitPole: the solution is to get someone to clean the things regularly.

[iheartthed]

you can make them go through security. per that article that is keeping them out of CAYMAC

But the security at CAYMC serves a function, since both the mayor's office and the city council member offices are in the building. Why not just pay someone to clean the bathrooms?

Homeless people using restrooms in train and bus stations are a non-issue as far as I'm concerned. I haven't used a train or bus station in a major city yet where that practice wasn't the norm.

[Danny]

In Royal Oak At the SMART Transit Center. They put quarters boxes in both Male and Female restrooms. That would keep the problems down.

[R8RBOB]

Is it possible for the city to setup some Port-a-Johns so that these bums can have a place to take a shit and not funk up the bus station? Set up some portables by some of the abandoned buildings and tell the homeless to go there.

[ghettopalmetto]

Put a babuszka lady in each bathroom who is responsible for its cleaning, and charge a nominal fee to use the commode. Problem solved.

[Detroitnerd]

Some of those old Polish ladies are pretty strict! I'd be on my best behavior.

[ghettopalmetto]

Some of those old Polish ladies are pretty strict! I'd be on my best behavior.

I'm just sayin that if it works in the pit-of-hell that is Warszawa Centralna railway station, it'll sure as hell work in Detroit's little bus terminal.

[DetroitPole]

I'm just sayin that if it works in the pit-of-hell that is Warszawa Centralna railway station, it'll sure as hell work in Detroit's little bus terminal.

Pit-of-hell is right. However I'd rather travel out of there than the Rosa Parks Transit center any day. Says a lot really...a former-Soviet bloc country with an antiquated train station and faltering economy can operate a transit center and Detroit can't...guess Detroit really is Third World, if the Second World has it beat.

[Khartoum]

How many stalls does the men's or women's restroom have? Please don't tell me their's only one or two for a facility that handles more people than a highway rest area.

I think I remember there being either 2 or 3 stalls in the men's bathroom.

If you charged 25 cents to use the stall, you would simply have people back behind the Farwell shitting & pissing all over.

[jcole]

What about this:

Not so many decades ago, the phrase "Paris public toilets" evoked images of smelly streetcorner pissoirs, hole-in-the-floor squat toilets at neighborhood cafés, and lavatories ruled by female attendants with the demeanor of prison guards. Today, nearly all of the vespasiennes or pissoirs are gone, and tourists of both sexes are well-served by modern, self-cleaning toilets known as sanisettes on boulevards and in parks throughout the city.

The sanisettes come in several styles, but all have the same basic design: You press a button (or, in some cases, insert a coin) to open the door, and when you step inside, a sensor in the floor causes the door to close and lock. You do your business, then open the door and exit. The door closes again, the toilet is automatically cleaned and disinfected by a motorized mechanism, and a green light signals that the lavatory is ready for the next user.

http://europeforvisitors.com/paris/a...ic-toilets.htm
Yes it would cost upfront, but think of the savings in the long run. Who says America has the best standard of living in the world?

[DetroitPlanner]

Put a babuszka lady in each bathroom who is responsible for its cleaning, and charge a nominal fee to use the commode. Problem solved.

Many of the rest rooms in Ireland do this. You have to pay someone stationed at the door to enter.