A cleaner at work at one of the metro Line 2 stations Photo: Yang Lan/GT

Toilets can be smelly, dirty and uncomfortable but they are needed everywhere. The United Nations has proclaimed November 19 as World Toilet Day to promote these basic but vital sanitation services for people. To check how Shanghai's public toilets stack up the Global Times undertook a "toilet tour" of some of the major tourist spots. The worst toilets discovered on this tour were to be found in metro stations. The public toilets in metro Line 2 stations, for example, were damp, dim and poorly ventilated. There were also constant queues for the women's toilets.

"In Shanghai city toilets are readily available. This is a good thing. Since 2005 when Shanghai hosted the World Toilet Forum, I have seen big efforts made to improve the toilets situation here. Shanghai even has toilet maps," Jack Sim, the founder of the World Toilet Organization told the Global Times. "However, toilets are used by people from all levels of society and some don't behave so well. It just takes a few and a toilet will be in a terrible state. This is why there needs to be professional cleaning and maintenance and proper replenishment of supplies all the time."

There are no public toilets listed on this Xintiandi map. Photo: Yang Lan/GT

A surprise

A tourist walking from People's Square to the famous Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street might be surprised but there are no public toilets in this street. Toilets can only be found in the shopping centers along the road.

There are no toilets on the ground floor of the Shanghai No. 1 Department Store in Nanjing Road. All the toilets are located on the second floor or above. On the second floor, there were two toilets but one is dedicated to patrons of a particular brand so the public really only has access to one.

"There are so many people coming to use this toilet that the queue is always very long. The day before yesterday, three ladies got into a huge fight after waiting for a long time in the queue," the cleaner at that toilet told the Global Times. "If it was not for my colleague who broke it up they would have killed each other." The toilet is packed during meal times and at weekends - not with shoppers but with tourists and others who can't find toilets on the street outside.

There's a similar situation at the Orient Shopping Centre where the toilets are also found on the second floor and there are long queues on weekends and Fridays. But there are other problems here.

"All the female toilets here are toilet bowls, so many users stand on these bowls instead of sitting on them. They leave mess in the bowl and wee all over the floor. One lady left farces under some toilet paper on the floor - and she seemed to be beautifully dressed," complained one cleaner. She spends her day there from 9 am to 10 pm cleaning and trying to keep order.

World Toilet Organization founder said it is best to have a mixture of bowl and squat toilets available. "We need signage outside the cubicles to show if it is a squat or a sit-down toilet. You must cater for all sorts. Some come from the countryside," Sim said.

Two public toilets are shown on this map of the Lujiazui Pearl Ring area. Photo: Yang Lan/GT

Different cultures

"Toilet cultures are different in different countries and places. To achieve our vision of toilets that are 100 percent clean, we need everyone to expect every toilet to be clean at all times. This kind of expectation will drive the demand for professional cleaning. And if we regard clean toilets as an essential service and demand the same standard as international airport toilets, we can then expect toilets to be kept clean at all times," Sim said.

"Expectations drive demand and demand drives supply and behavioral change. It may cost more at first but once people are used to expecting clean toilets at all times, there will be a social revolution that will be irreversible. And that will become a permanently good part of the culture. Although we will still need cleaners available for the few that will persist in misbehaving."

Next on the tour was the Bund from the end of the Nanjing Road Pedestrian Street. There are five public toilets on the Bund Sightseeing Avenue and the toilets outside the Sightseeing Tunnel are open 24 hours a day. Three groups of cleaners work on shifts there,

Here there are four toilet bowls and eleven squats in the female section and it looks fairly clean despite the constant coming and going of hundreds of visitors every hour.

"Thousands of people come and go every day. Sometimes, they have to queue because there are too many wanting to get in. Chinese people still don't like toilet bowls and prefer squat toilets. A lot of foreigners come here as well," a cleaner told the Global Times.

But while toilets along the Bund are easy to find, other tourist attractions in the city make it more difficult for visitors to find relief. In the Yuyuan Garden, one of the most publicized sightseeing spots, for example, there are seven public toilets. However they are located inside and some of them are beside shop fronts and they are not well sign-posted. Similarly in Xintiandi. On its online map there are no toilets listed. The Global Times asked and was directed to a small public toilet in Xintiandi and told there was another one close by outside.

Ms Hu shows the child's toilet at the public toilets at 61 Century Avenue. Photo: Yang Lan/GT

A cozy retreat

The coziest toilet on the toilet tour was certainly at Lujiazui at 61 Century Avenue. In Lujiazui there are two public toilets around the Pearl Ring, two in the Lujiazui Central Greenland, and six along Binjiang Avenue, according to the guidebooks.

The toilet on 61 Century Avenue is the den of Ms Hu who runs it and keeps it in clean, working every second day from 5 am to midnight. This convenience is clean, has squat and bowl toilets as well as a nursing room with a child's toilet. There's also a disabled toilet.

According to thepaper.cn, Shanghai has built 60 new public toilets and renovated 482 over the past two years. The public satisfaction of toilets in Shanghai has improved from 82.53 points to 84.99 points. Shanghai's department of afforestation and city appearance is increasing the number of accessible toilets stalls in the city's public toilets to over 200. These stalls are designed for the elderly, children and the disabled and the city will also increase the ratio of female to male toilets to 3:2.

"World Toilet Day gives us the legitimacy to discuss an otherwise taboo subject so that we can speak out and find solutions to toilet problems. For example, in cities, ladies have to queue for public toilets. We can demand that more female toilets be constructed. Rural school and home toilets also have to improve in China," Sim said.