By Charlotte Robertson

Last week, Mayor Eric Adams announced a new “Ur in Luck” campaign that aims to improve public restrooms in New York City by building 46 new facilities and renovating three dozen others over the next several years. The city also unveiled a new map of what it said are the nearly 1,000 existing public toilets across New York. West Side Rag published the map of the Upper West Side locations and invited readers to tell us if they knew of any neighborhood facilities missing from the map.

It turns out what the map was missing was this: an accurate portrayal of the condition of the 26 UWS public toilets listed by the city. Commenters quickly pointed out some were closed or in such poor sanitary condition that people might think twice before entering. 

The Rag asked me to take a public restroom tour in the neighborhood, using the city’s map and readers’ suggestions. I visited most of the map’s UWS restrooms, and here’s what I found:

After docking my Citibike on West 104th Street and Amsterdam, I made my way to Ellington in the Park, where one of the 12 public restrooms scattered throughout Riverside Park’s 81 blocks is located. On this particular Friday afternoon, the restaurant was pumping Frank Sinatra’s “Theme from New York” as dozens gathered around picnic tables, cracking sleek cans of IPA, at a corporate party. 

Despite the crowd, it was fairly easy to find the restroom — to the right of the glimmering neon sign, behind a pile of trash bags. A paper printout warned me before entering — NO WATER TOYS, BUCKETS, OR SAND IN RESTROOM. The ladies’ line was lengthy but worth the wait. With functional hand driers and updated tiling, I had a reasonably enjoyable bathroom experience. 

The restroom by the soccer field on 100th Street was also in decent condition, though there were a lot of flies buzzing around. The facility has three stalls, one of which is accessible for those with disabilities. The large blue tiles make the room look like a swimming pool. Just be sure to use the outdoor entrance, to the left—the connecting field house is a private area. 

A few blocks south at Riverside Park’s Dinosaur Playground, the situation was very different. 

Past the jungle gym and sprinkler area is a tri-arched structure resembling a stalactite-covered cave, complete with an expansive puddle of mysterious dark water. As if compelled by survival instinct, I checked the crumbling ceiling corners for sleeping bats. A sign warned me not to litter, smoke, drink, or do my laundry in the sink. It also provided the restroom’s operating hours: 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., with an ambiguous “open later seasonally” note. Based on the state of the facility, I am willing to bet that these times are not strictly enforced. 

The restroom itself is perfect if you are in possession of your own soap, toilet paper, and personal potty (one of the four stalls was missing a toilet altogether).  The restroom’s changing table looked about as sanitary as a subway seat. Stowed between the pane and lip of the open window was a yellow caution sign, perhaps an appropriate warning about the facility’s condition. 

In January, the New York City Design Commission unanimously approved an $8.6 million renovation of Dinosaur Playground, which seeks to address flooding and disability accessibility issues. However, the restroom was not included in the proposal—in fact, Design Commission representatives present at the January 16 City Hall meeting objected to restroom renovation, citing the need for a budget delegated specifically to a facilities makeover. 

While none of the other locations in the park were quite as abysmal, both restrooms at Hippo Playground and River Run Playground are in desperate need of a makeover. The former was swarming with flies. The dim light barely illuminated a dingy, cracked sink. The two stall doors were missing outer handles, so I had to open them from the top, which was coated in dust. The River Run facility was cramped—the room itself is very narrow, so the four stalls sat awkwardly close together. Neither facility was accessible. It was especially disappointing considering these Riverside Park bathrooms are right next to playgrounds, where they are needed most. 

Riverside Park also includes one facility (not on the city’s map) that appears to have been closed for some time. It’s around West 108th Street, near the soccer field, skatepark, and basketball-handball-pickleball courts. Considering the sheer square footage, paired with the bustling location that has only increased in popularity post-pickleball-plague, I was surprised to see how dilapidated this padlocked, graffiti-coated restroom is. Some Riverside Park pickleball players are currently petitioning to restore the restroom. 

Though the city does not list the defunct 108th Street restroom, it does include at least one UWS facility that is out of commission. The Anibal Aviles Playground on West 108th Street and Amsterdam is temporarily closed, though the city’s list says it’s available. Since Anibal Aviles is closed, I also checked out a nearby facility in Morningside Park, at West 112th Street, where the public restroom resembles more of a janitorial closet, with rakes, cartons of gasoline, milk crates, wooden chairs, and a leaf blower stored behind the locked gates, with a “Closed for the Season” sign acting as a meek defense. Nearby, I watched a children’s soccer practice and wondered if the 20 or so kids would resort to a nearby, sketchy-looking port-a-potty, if necessary. 

In Central Park, the restrooms in North Meadow and the Delacorte Theater show up on the city’s map, but both are actually closed for construction (a friend of mine advised against the latter anyway, calling the entire facility “sticky”). 

The open restrooms in Central Park, all listed on the city’s map, were generally well-kept. The red-brick, single-stall structure on the Great Hill was well-stocked and tidy. Great Hill was the quietest of all my public restroom stops, with no line and only a handful of people nearby typing on computers, eating blueberries, stretching on yoga mats, and napping in Speedos across the grass.

The Tennis Center restrooms in Central Park flank the pro shop and snack bar, and each boast six stalls, though none are wheelchair accessible. There was a fair amount of traffic—mostly kids. When I entered the women’s restroom there, a woman and her young son were singing a song about flushing the toilet. The walls are slathered in a gray landlord special, but the toilets and the sink appeared to be regularly cleaned. 

Of all the restrooms in Central Park, the one by Le Pain Quotidien in Sheep Meadow had the longest line—nine women. Perhaps this is why there was no soap. Luckily, Tavern on the Green was a short walk away, though the entrance to the public restrooms there is not obvious—tucked away near the outdoor seating area, to the left of the restaurant’s front entrance. Behind the ornate door, a clean set of stalls awaits, one of which is wheelchair accessible. The facility by the park’s downtown entrance on West 61st Street was also adequately serviced and accessible.

Other public restrooms advertised on the map are part of the city’s Privately Owned Public Spaces (POPS), outdoor and indoor areas maintained by private owners who, in exchange for granting public access, get some extra floor area or real estate waivers. The POPS at 61 West 62nd Street is closed to the public for the foreseeable Mondays, as well as on July 2nd. The POPS at 2 Lincoln Square is located within the American Folk Art Museum, where admission is free. The bathroom is a single-stall, gender neutral facility with lots of privacy and space. The operating hours are limited—closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, open the rest of the week from 11:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

The best public restroom I used, by far, is not included on the city’s map—at the Shops at Columbus Circle. For a public facility, the restroom is challenging to find. Take the escalator to the second floor and then follow a long, shiny hallway past the elevators. The multi-stall, accessible bathroom was very sanitary, with 10 spotless sinks. Tiny red and purple tiles frame the large mirrors, equipped with striking vanity lights. 

If I learned anything from my expedition, it is that public restrooms are fickle—in cleanliness, in accessibility, in hours of operation. While “Ur in Luck” is a step in the right direction, I cannot help but wonder about its actual impact. The campaign seeks to upgrade and add to the city’s existing facilities. But of the 15 restrooms mentioned in this article, eight were insufficient—in just one section of the city.

And I wonder how this campaign works with the $58 million public library budget cut.

The bathroom on the second floor of Bloomingdale Library at 105 West 100th Street is clean and accessible, having been renovated in 2021—though one of the three toilets was out of order, the rest of the facility was well-maintained. The changing table was sanitary, with a sweet paper flier listing fun songs to share while changing a baby’s diaper (“Roly-poly, roly-poly, up up up! Legs are up! Roly-poly, roly roly-poly, down down down! Legs are down!”). There is a small step-stool for children to reach the sink.

And the restroom at St. Agnes Library on Amsterdam at West 83rd Street is both clean and private, but you need to ask for a key at the front desk to enter. Both Bloomingdale and St. Agnes add a relieving bonus of air conditioning. 

A final cautionary note: as one WSR reader, Josh P., commented, this is not the city’s first public restroom campaign. In 2008, the first public toilet kiosk opened in Madison Square Park, as part of an initiative by then-mayor Mike Bloomberg to construct 20 public toilets around the city, a delayed response to a 1990 lawsuit filed by a coalition of homeless people against the MTA. Fourteen years later, The City reported that only five of those promised toilets had been built.

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