Seattle Got Embarrassed By Something Which Should Embarrass Fort Worth

Continuing on with my popular series of bloggings about something I read in a west coast newspaper that one is very unlikely to read in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

First off I must mention again that Fort Worth may have the highest number of outhouses, per capita, of any town in America.

Along with the highest number of parks, per capita, with outhouses instead of modern restroom facilities with running water.

In some Fort Worth parks, such as Oakland Lake Park, one can now find a solar powered trash compactor, compacting trash near the park's outhouse.

Meanwhile, in a west coast town called Portland, great success has been had with something called a Portland Loo, basically a solar powered mini-restroom, with running water for hand washing.

I learned of the Portland Loo this morning in the Seattle Times, in an article titled After embarrassment, Seattle finds public toilet that's just right.

That is a screen cap of part of the article that you see above, including a picture of a Portland Loo.

The embarrassment the article's title refers to I had never heard of, previously, likely due to the fact that this particular Seattle embarrassment occurred well after I began observing Fort Worth's myriad embarrassments.

The Seattle embarrassment came about in 2003, soon after the city spent $5 million for five high tech, self-cleaning toilets.

A million bucks a toilet? That's not even the embarrassing part.

Apparently these  mini-restrooms were quite roomy and luxurious. This had them become popular spots for drug use, for homeless people to wash their clothes, for hookers to use as a base of operations and for other couples to do that thing that married people do that results in babies.

In 2008 the Seattle mini-restrooms were sold on Ebay for $2,500 a piece.

The Portland Loos are way cheaper than the Seattle Million Dollar Loos, costing around $230,000, including installation.

Like Fort Worth's trash compactors, Portland Loos are solar-powered. I have no clue what the sun is powering, or what the backup is on Seattle's many cloudy days.

The Portland Loos have their hand washing sinks outside the facility, thus discouraging desperate bathers.

Now, when I read about these new Loos and Seattle being embarrassed by their failed Million Dollar Loos it crossed my mind to wonder how one town can be embarrassed by such a thing, while another town is not embarrassed by having outhouses in their parks. With no running water.

And aren't even embarrassed that their town's imaginary best urban waterfront music venue in Texas is serviced by outhouses, dressed up by concrete enclosures.

Those of you new to the plot, that town with outhouses at the imaginary best waterfront music venue in Texas is Fort Worth.

Fort Worth drug a Portland streetcar to town in an attempt to get the locals to buy into the idea of a modern streetcar.

Maybe Fort Worth could drag a Portland Loo to town in an attempt to get the locals to buy into the idea of modern, hygienic, restroom facilities....