Guangzhou to convert some male toilets into unisex toilet to improve efficiency in utilization

The urban management authority of Guangzhou, South China’s Guangdong Province, has started soliciting public opinions on converting some men’s toilets into unisex toilets to deal with the problem of long queues outside of women’s toilets and the unreasonable ratio of male and female toilets. The plan has drawn a lot of attention from the public. 

According to a statement on the website of Guangzhou urban management and comprehensive law enforcement bureau, the city will continue to build more public toilets, rebuild and expand the public toilets, as well as conduct rectification on men’s toilets to cope with the shortage of women’s toilets in some parts of the city, Guangzhou Daily reported on Wednesday. 

The public toilet plan wants to transform some public toilets into unisex toilets for either male or female, converting some men’s toilets into gender-neutral toilets to cope with the unreasonable ratio of male to female stalls and low utilization of male stalls. The plan also includes the renovation of some toilets.

According to the draft plan, the demand for the number of public toilets in the city will be estimated between 6,405 and 10,675 during the period from 2024 to 2035. The current number of public toilets meets the standard requirements of three to five toilets in each square kilometer, but there is an issue of uneven distribution, The Paper reported on Wednesday. 

In addition, the plan also suggests to build children-friendly toilets to cater to the demands from children and provide children with humanized service facilities. 

Meanwhile, the plan in solicitation has aroused heated discussions online with many netizens suggesting to build more toilets for women. 

According to an official from the urban management and comprehensive law enforcement bureau, the unisex toilets or the gender-neutral toilets refer to all-gender toilets that can be used by either men or women. When a unisex toilet is locked by the user, the light outside will be turned on to show it is occupied, Nanfang Daily reported on Wednesday. 

According to the official, Guangzhou has already set up more than a dozen such toilets to flexibly adjust the allocation of stalls for men and women to accommodate different demands at different times, thereby improving efficiency.

According to the plan, 933 toilets will be newly built or expanded by 2035, with 308 among them completing construction or expansion by 2030.