The Days of a Free Pee are Over

Is it one more example of a once free, public good gone the way of privatization? Is it a sign of the decay of Western civilization? Or at least of its toilet facilities?

Two schools near the town of Marburg were fed up with the appalling state of their toilets. Seats were often ripped off the bowls, graffiti was scrawled on the partitions, hygiene conditions were, well, less than ideal.

So the schools decided to go on the offensive against toilet abusers. They renovated several of the schools' restrooms and then put them under guard -- not armed, but under the strict watch of so-called Klofrauen, women whose job it is to maintain order and cleanliness in public facilities. They're a frequent sight in many public toilets, but generally not at schools.

However, students and school administrators had just had enough of the execrable state of their lavatories.

"The facilities are often in such a condition, that it is just no fun to go to the toilet. Many kids just hold it in," a speaker for the school district told Hessian Broadcasting.

Not anymore. Those students who want to spend their toilet time surrounded by gleaming surfaces and toilet paper dispensers that are always full can cough up the ten cents it now costs to use the new loos.

But administrators at the school are not merciless. Those kids who might not have any spare change on them don't have to grin and bear it, or wet their pants, there are a few non-renovated toilets that'll still allow kids to pee for free.