Futuristic High-Tech Toilets
Kind of the antithesis of the rest of my collection, I have encountered a few stunningly futuristic facilities.
The automated public toilets now common in France.
Originally they were coin-operated, but now they are free.
The newer design of entry panel seen here shows an orange "unavailable" indicator — the toilet is in its cleaning cycle immediately after a use.
The older design at left shows a green "LIBRE" or free indicator, it will open when you press the large button.
The toilet design has changed over time.
The older ones, at left, had an unusual design. The bowl was just that — a bowl with no drain. It is flushed after you leave the compartment by rotating back into the wall and being hosed out.
The newer ones, at right, have a more conventional design. But they are still retracted and sprayed down after every use.
Compartments on the panel above the toilet dispense toilet paper and provide water, soap, and hot air for hand cleaning.
A floor sensor detects whether a person is really inside or not. If there is no person, or after a period of time even if there is a person, the door automatically opens.
After the person steps out, the door closes and the entire interior is sprayed with a disinfectant. The toilet bowl is rotated back into the wall and hosed out. After this quick cycle of 60 seconds or less, it is available for the next user.
This is a Toilette a Grande Vitesse, or a High Speed Toilet, found on the TGV or Train a Grande Vitesse, the High Speed Train running through France.
Before leaving my seat, my GPS had synced up and was indicating a speed of 305 km/hour.
At left is an electically-powered toilet seat in a luxury hotel room in Tokyo, Japan.
It was the Hotel Intercontinental, I was there on business. It wasn't the hotel in "Lost in Translation" but it might as well have been.
The toilet had a couple of dials and some push buttons, and the inside of the seat had a multi-paragraph manual explaining its operation.
Unfortunately, it was only in Japanese. The only English warned that you shouldn't break the toilet or urinate all over the seat. But that's always good advice!
Below that are some better images of a similar high-tech Japanese toilet.
This one is in the Tokyu Haneda Hotel, including an image of the instruction manual. This one has at least a little English.
A waterless urinal, which is only slightly high-tech. The first one of these I saw was at Fort Huachuca, in south-eastern Arizona. It featured an eye-level explanation of how the things work: Teflon-like non-wetting surface, a collection vessel with a layer of light oil so the urine collects below a sealed oil surface. However, as Fort Huachuca is where the US Army does its intelligence training, it's not the best place to be taking pictures.
Taking pictures in public restrooms is bad enough, but taking pictures on intelligence bases is even worse.
I had to wait until spotting this one in the Dark Horse Tavern along North Highland Avenue in the Virginia Highlands area of Atlanta, Georgia, USA, to collect an image of a waterless toilet.
And at left is a second waterless urinal, actually a pair. Unlike the above, with its marble-flecked plastic material, this Sloan Waterfree unit appears to be traditional porcelain, although probably with a teflon-like coating on the, ah, active surface. This pair is found in the American Tap Room bar in the Reston Town Center, Reston, Virginia, USA.
Here is a slightly different waterless model, featuring the fly image pioneered by the urinals at Schiphol Airport outside Amsterdam (it's a bee here). A small target on which to concentrate? A distraction? Whatever the mechanism, it is said to significantly improve cleanliness.
Somewhat ironically, this high-tech urinal was spotted in the Hand and Bell Tavern in Boston, which claims to be the oldest bar in U.S. (1795).
The "Sani-Seat" toilets at O'Hare Airport (ORD), outside Chicago, USA. You push a button on the wall and the plastic wrapper around the seat advances.
What are these like for the user?
Imagine starting with the least comfortable toilet seat shape ever designed, and then wrapping it in crinkly waxed baking paper.
It's like that, except less comfortable.
A fairly high-tech urinal in the park adjacent to the campus of Cambridge University. The hand-washing water flushes it, and there is a (nearly hidden) hot-air hand drier also built in.
Not handicap-accessible, so this is not Steven Hawking's. (He is on the faculty there, in the position once held by Isaac Newton)
Also see the Toilets of Higher Education page.
The super-fancy bathroom in the Ambassador Suite in the Westin Boston Waterfront hotel, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
When you turn on the bathroom light, a television set embedded behind the mirror turns on. And there is what appears to be an Ethernet jack in the wall above the handrail next to the toilet!
However, the Westin Boston Waterfront hotel has horrible service. I was there for two weeks while working at a conference (although not staying in the suite!). Don't stay there, it's horrible:
- One evening the bellman pushed our group into a dangerous van instead of the taxi we had requested. The driver did not know where we were going, and then asked for $50 for a one-mile trip. Half the seats in the van had their backs broken off, and the roof-mounted air conditioning unit sprinkled water through the back half of the van.
- Our used damp washclothes were left to pile up in the bathtub, and we had to go downstairs to ask for replacement bottles of shampoo multiple times during our stay.
- The concierge was so unfamiliar with the area that he could not even tell me where a mailbox was located.
- This hotel is so petty and fixated on taking the guest for everything possible that they even bill for placing toll-free calls! And, there is no warning in the room that they are going to charge you for this. I questioned this at checkout and a staff member rudely snapped at me, "All hotels do that!". No, they don't, just the rude ones.
| A Sani-Flush blue border indicates a toilet that I've used. |
Also see my pressure-flushing toilet page.
If you're not bored yet, you might be interested in (or at least tolerate):
