These Lower Mainland washrooms have a special ability
A number of Lower Mainland cities have installed or are planning to install self-cleaning public restrooms.
Urben Blu, a Quebec-based company that specializes in prefabricated self-cleaning washrooms, has received orders from Burnaby, Port Moody, and Abbotsford.
“Abbotsford, they bought one six months ago, they bought another one two months ago and another one last week,” said Alain Bolduc, VP of sales for the company.
With the lack of public washroom access a growing concern, he says that his product can help cities fill an important need.
“We have a lot of homeless people,” he said. “They need to go somewhere. If they don’t go in the public restroom, they go into a restaurant, they go anywhere else,” he said.
He said that they can also save cities money, as they cost $275,000 to install a single unit and $375,000 for a double unit.
While it might sound expensive, he said that it costs 40 per cent less for their pre-made units than to build a standard restroom one on-site.
“Because when you construct on site, you need construction people, they need to pour the concrete, they need to build a wall, then a plumber, then the electrician,” Bolduc said.
Self-cleaning
Another way that Bolduc said self-cleaning washrooms can cut down costs is that cities don’t have to hire people to clean them, adding that cities can save up to $25,000 a year on cleaning and maintenance costs.
Urben Blu
“If you have to send somebody five, six times a day, it costs a lot,” he said.
After each use, the toilet is cleaned, disinfected, and dried in about 45 seconds. There’s also the option to self-clean the floor, which uses high-pressure water sprinklers that push the dirt to drains, which they recommend programming to happen every 10-15 uses.
Bolduc started the company in 2010, after seeing the concept in Europe. They now have over 150 toilets installed across North America.
While the City of Vancouver doesn’t have any Urben Blu products, they do have self-cleaning washrooms, including one at Granville and Robson. They’ve also been installing ‘Portland Loos’ around the City, which is a prefabricated washroom that can be cleaned by pressure washing. In 2022, the City installed a pair of Portland Loo washrooms for about $700,000.
The City has dealt with years-long calls from the public about a lack of washroom access, especially in high-traffic areas and places with higher populations of people experiencing homelessness, mental health issues, and addiction.