Our Honolulu
Downtown relief hard to find
By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Staff Writer
A recent column about hard-to-find toilets in Our Honolulu opened the floodgate, so to speak, to lively discussion. It turns out that you're in trouble downtown if you are out on the street on foot, have to go to the bathroom and don't have a key.
Eloise Van Niel, a retiree, put the case succinctly in a letter:
"There are practically no public restrooms in Our Honolulu downtown for those not working there on a 9-to-5 basis. I walk downtown Tuesday and Thursday mornings before I go to the YWCA pool at 10 a.m.
"I can assure you, I have experienced the crisis of public restrooms to such a degree that I have identified the relief stations."
As a public service, we list them here:
• The Hawai'i State Library, which opens at 9 a.m.
• YWCA on Richards Street.
• Liberty House, Fort Street Mall.
• Satellite City Hall, Fort Street Mall.
• Maybe the Capitol and Honolulu Hale — if you can make it.
Van Niel continued, "If you're lucky, you can scurry into some restaurant that happens to be open and happens to have a restroom. This is uncertain.
"Has anybody noticed the tour buses which stop on Richards Street so their tourist load can use the restrooms at the YWCA? They are so frequent that the YW has put their men's and women's under lock and key, available from the desk."
I must admit that I once had to beg a guard at First Hawaiian Bank to let me into a restroom. He said those at the bank are locked for security reasons.
Frankly, I've found that hunting for a john downtown can be a multicultural adventure. When I asked to use one at a Chinese fast-food place, it was a co-ed facility that you get to through the kitchen.
B. Millar writes that downtown isn't the only toilet-deprived part of O'ahu. The postcard Millar sent issues a challenge: "Leave any Waikiki hotel after breakfast. Walk three blocks in any direction and then try to find a toilet. Good luck."
In defense of Waikiki, I should point out that the renovation of Kuhio Beach includes spick-and-span restrooms. I know, I got there just in time.
Mrs. Clark Hastert of Kalanianaole Highway took a historical view, having researched Bob Schmitt's "Book of Firsts" in regard to toilets that flush.
The first flusher was installed in Kamehameha IV's new house on the grounds of old 'Iolani Palace in 1856. Then followed the Queen's Hospital in 1860, Hawaiian Hotel in 1872, the Opera House in 1880 and 'Iolani Palace in 1881.
B.F. Dillingham put in the first private flush toilet up in Woodlawn.
By 1886, the Board of Health had registered its disapproval, warning that water-closets, sinks and baths in the interior of homes were gassy, noisome and a danger to public heath.
