alt.hn

4/9/2026 at 3:43:25 PM

The best seat in town

 https://www.torched.la/the-best-seat-in-town/

by NaOH

4/10/2026 at 11:37:35 PM

As an occasional visitor to Paris, I was quite astonished at how nice at least the central parts of the city have become under the 12-year tenure of Mayor Hidalgo (admittedly with the help of gobs of public funding for the Olympics). It's so much more green, clean, and biking/pedestrian friendly than it used to be.

I gather locals who drive are in violent disagreement with me on this, and Paris is a big place that extends well beyond the posh touristy arrondissements, but it's still remarkable -- especially given that the downtowns of most American big cities have gone downhill in the same time period.

by decimalenough

4/10/2026 at 7:15:22 PM

Public restrooms are a sign of advanced civilizations. It's a pity that they have to be built to withstand damage from hooligans.

by pstuart

4/10/2026 at 11:24:00 PM

The existence of well maintained and clean public restrooms and hooligans is a shibboleth for culture. Some cultures are simply superior.

by mcculley

4/10/2026 at 11:55:14 PM

I’m currently travelling in China and the total absence of graffiti and the wide availability of public toilets as well as the general cleanliness of the place is a stark contrast to London. I am somewhat dreading that part when I return.

by gbuk2013

4/10/2026 at 8:01:28 PM

The restroom building provides more utility than most buildings do to a hooligan. Unclear why it is an enemy.

by Computer0

4/10/2026 at 8:22:04 PM

Vandalism scales linearly with [accessible, visible, unsupervised].

Uncorrelated with the usefulness of the building after controlling for other factors

by CGMthrowaway

4/10/2026 at 8:07:32 PM

Any "private" space in a public place becomes valuable with more density. It's basic scarcity incentives. It unfortunately incentivizes hooligans to make the restroom appear even more disheveled and unsafe to increase the privacy (less people want to go in it)

by staplers

4/10/2026 at 8:59:53 PM

"JCDeaux basically invented the idea of Street furniture"

That is a fairly strong claim on the surface and the company's website has a slightly different one:

"In 1964, Jean-Claude Decaux invented advertising street furniture."

Such a fundamental mistake in the opening paragraph. Made me realize I could not trust whatever was written afterwards.

by readthenotes1

4/10/2026 at 8:43:30 PM

I don't really understand why the author is dumping on LA's toilets so much while praising how Parisian toilets are so useful for everyday people like commuters. The LA Metro program, which is expanding and seems to be very successful, has very different goals and challenges than the skid row public bathrooms.

by Rebelgecko

4/10/2026 at 11:33:49 PM

Not sure why you're bringing subways into this, since the Paris Metro wipes the floor with the LA Metro. 16 lines and still growing, not including the even more rapidly expanding modern tram network.

by decimalenough

4/11/2026 at 1:14:49 AM

The author actually brought up commuters! I thought the LA Metro bathrooms are more relevant for that use case, so it seems weird that the author ignores those while focusing on bathroom programs for the homeless (not that homeless people don't deserve bathrooms, but the picture they paint of regular every day folks in Paris is not comparable to the skid row bathroom users)

LA Metro has a mere 120 miles of track vs Paris's 150 miles, but in our defense they had a 90 year head start :)

by Rebelgecko