City's New Toilets Nearing Availability

The first of 20 planned automatic public toilets across the five boroughs is expected to open this week in Madison Square Park, after construction and testing is completed.

The toilets are part of a 20-year contract with the Spanish advertising firm Cemusa Inc., which won a coordinated street furniture bid in 2005 to install 3,300 new bus shelters, 330 newsstands, and 20 public toilets within the next five years. The project, which utilizes tempered glass and stainless steel structures designed by the New York architecture firm Grimshaw Architects, is expected to gross the city $1.4 billion in funds and advertising space over 20 years.

The wheelchair accessible, single occupancy toilet facilities will cost customers 25 cents and will run through a 60-second automatic cleaning cycle after every use, a spokeswoman for Cemusa, Katherine Schwab, said. The facilities have a 15-minute time limit, and the toilet doors will automatically open when the time expires.

Each borough will have at least one toilet, Ms. Schwab said, but Cemusa has not yet decided on the locations of all the facilities.

This opening marks the end of a long battle for public toilets in the city that started in 1992 under Mayor Dinkins, when city officials experimented with pay toilets but soon abandoned the plan.

In December 2006, Mayor Bloomberg unveiled the first of the Cemusa bus shelters in Queens, and more bus shelters and newsstands have begun sprouting up around the city since then. The city may also purchase Cemusa's trash bins and news racks, but no plans have been formalized, Ms. Schwab said.

Cemusa has also installed toilets in Spain and South America.