Flusher

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Our First Inspection

On this trip to Toronto, we are helping our son with a project he is working on. It is a phone app that gives people information about washrooms in the Toronto area. The focus is on accessibility of the buildings and accessible features in the washroom. The app focuses on washrooms in public parks originally but other locations can be added, but in order for the app to be accurate and useful these washrooms had to be actually inspected by someone. Ryan was unable to find anyone locally who was willing to do this task, so he called his retired parents and offered the job to us.

On the first day we used public transportation and got seven washrooms done with 14 km walking, so or goal of 120 in a week was not going to work. We rented a nice little sub-compact car and on the second day, working from the extreme outskirts of the city we were able to get 21 inspected. This added expense would make the goal achievable. And so in five days we managed to get the 120

Typical Toronto Restroom

washrooms finished. Using the car also allowed us to do all the locations in the suburbs and locations away from the convenient public transportation system, leaving some of the washrooms in the central core of the city to be done on foot.

You might think this would be a rather disgusting task (My brother's opinion), but in reality it was not. We only found one washroom that was really dirty, and it was because it was being repaired and so the doors were blocked open and litter and leaves had blown in. Most of the washrooms were clean and in good repair. Some were tired and worn but mostly clean. Even washrooms in rather depressed neighbourhoods were generally in good condition. Obviously the city of Toronto has a very

Excellent Service 

good maintenance program and we ran into white city of Toronto service trucks at many locations. I met one friendly employee at three different locations one day, and found plumbers, electricians and carpenters at various sites maintaining the facilities. So I can give the city of Toronto high marks for their public washroom program.

We did discover a group of locations that had been left off the list during our exploration of the city. Most neighbourhoods have beautiful community Recreation centres and these would be convenient and were all highly accessible, containing not only accessible facilities but also gender neutral washrooms. We suggested these sites as well as public libraries be added, and this will be done ASAP.

We did run into a few surprises. Regis went into one washroom and quickly came back out

Closed!

exclaiming “There's a Racoon in there!”; sure enough under a bench was a young racoon, but he was as terrified of her as she was to find him there. In another was an elderly gentleman sitting on the floor reading a book. It had started to rain unexpectedly that day, so he retreated to the washroom until the weather cleared. We found a number of washrooms were “Closed for the Season”, and realized that our timing was off by a week and most sites would be operational after the Victoria Day weekend. For some reason we found a couple of sites where the Women's restroom was unlocked but not the Men's. What was the reasoning here, women need to use the washroom more urgently than us men, or were the males expected to pee against the back wall?

When you are carrying a clipboard and pens into washrooms it does elicit some questions, and when we explained our mission, we always got positive feedback and people thought it was an excellent, much needed application. A good sign for the future of the “Flusher” app.

This one showed signs of flooding from river

We both agreed that in fact the job was not at all “Disgusting” and in fact we found it interesting to explore the various neighbourhoods around the GTA (Greater Toronto Area). We visited lovely parks, found nice walking trails and just got to see areas of the city we would not normally visit.

Many were actually attractive buildings

Where's That WC?

My latest travel adventure is again in Toronto. Last month we visited Alisha and Derek to help with a house renovation and I think Ryan and Ben got jealous so we received a call about coming up to help them with a project too.

Not exactly Wheelchair accessible

Working with a friend, Ryan is developing a phone app that will help people locate washrooms in and around the Toronto and Vancouver areas. Basically when you open the app on your phone, it identifies your present location and then displays any public washrooms in the area. Ryan asked us to come up and do inspection of over 150 washrooms so that information about them could be entered into the program. Things such as accessibility and amenities are important to people using the app. He had funding to hire someone to do this job, but was unable to find someone locally who wanted to do washroom inspections. SO . . he called his retired parents to help. It meant a paid trip to Toronto and an opportunity to spend time with he and Ben, so we said yes.

After some discussion about the best way to tackle the job, we decided to head out to the end of the Yonge St subway line and work our way through a cluster of sites out there to get a feel for exactly what was involved.

Time for the inspection

We exited the subway and opened the app which clearly directed us to the nearest washroom, about 30 minutes walking away. I was surprised that there were no facilities in or around the Subway station . . . but our job was to do the inspections so we set off following the directions to the first washroom. We walked down a residential street where the Toronto housing boom was evident with the little old houses on the street being torn down and replaced with huge new ones worth millions. We were then directed into a park and down into a ravine along a brook (Add note that this route not wheelchair accessible). We finally came out on the other side of the park where we found the washroom close to the park entrance and on a paved road. This might have been an easier way to get to the washroom.

WOW, did not expect to find this

Clipboards and checklists out, we finished this first inspection and headed to the next, about 15 minutes away in another municipal park. In this park we located three washrooms although the app only had two listed. Here we also discovered an amphitheatre and a ski hill along with a beautiful community centre. Who knew that Toronto had a ski hill within the city or an outdoor theatre big enough to host a Shakespearean Drama? From there we inspected washrooms in a Tennis club, a lawn bowling facility and another park. Fourteen Kilometres later we had discovered a lot more about this city than when we started.

We met a lot of people who wondered what we were doing, and who showed a great deal on interest and approval with the project. Everyone thought it was a very worthwhile idea and would be very useful to people. Seven down, lots more to do . . . . .

There were some failures