The Streets of San Francisco Are Covered in Human Shit

[Jesus Malverde]

Poop on Mission Street. Poop between cars. Poop in the alley. Poop in the Tenderloin. Poop in the escalator—so much poop that the escalator breaks down under the strain of all that poop. Everywhere you look, San Francisco residents are saying, there is poop, poop, poop.

The latest doodoo dispatch comes via a New York Times op-ed by Allison Arieff. She begins:

This past fall, a project started called (Human) Wasteland, which maps reports of human waste throughout the city of San Francisco. Yes, a disproportionate amount of poop on the streets is not from dogs but from humans.

Some in the blogosphere tended to play this for laughs, but the reality isn't very funny.

Counterpoint: it's a little funny. There's a nice poetic justice to the gilded paradise of new-money tech-dudes teeming with the inescapable waste of people left behind or displaced by the awful march of disruption.

But the jokes come as a consequence of a pressing and critical problem: Homelessness. (and drug use)

http://justice.gawker.com/the-streets-of-san-francisco-are-covered-in-human-shit-1679930931

[Katashi_itto]

1. Hope the 1% can stand the stench as they go about their business

[Recursion]

3. About 12% of residents of Mumbai have plumbing

And the 1% in Mumbai is richer than the 1% in SFO. So, yeah, they find ways to live with the stench...

[Jesus Malverde]

4. [phone]

Exactamundo

[LiberalElite]

6. Just keep the limo windows up and the AC cranked nt

[dissentient]

2. Yep. And there are drug addicts and the areas they hang out in right near the tourist areas

Still a great city, but it has these issues.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

5. I have peed in "hidden" public spaces but thank God never pooped.

I drove from Vegas back to L A the Sunday after Christmas stopped at a gas station and there must have been thirty people on line. I just drove a couple of blocks down and relieved myself on some bushes.

[NV Whino]

7. SF (and the U.S. for that matter)

Doesn't believe in public toilets. Contrast that to almost any city across the pond.

[MH1]

8. Public toilets are SOCIALIST!!!!1!

You'd have to raise my income tax by 2 cents per year to pay for that. And we can't have that.

[Jesus Malverde]

9. or asia

One problem is in the SF homeless people see an unoccupied public toilet as a future home. They move in and never leave. The laws are such that moving them only invites litigation.



After 911 BART (bay area rapid transport) closed it's public toilets for security reasons, they still are closed.

Even the night market in Taipei taiwan has public toilets. There is something broken in the united states when we cannot have safe, clean, sanitary public spaces. Not sure if its litigation or whatever but something is seriously broken.

[madville]

12. Or they turn into brothels or places to hook up

Ask that one Republican Senator

[winetourdriver]

10. lack of public rest rooms

I have lived in San Francisco for many years, and yes, the problem is associated with drug dealing (the dealers dont want to take time off to hunt up a john), and homelessness- This city has NEVER had a serious plan to deal with the estimated 6k homeless here. It is, however, an exageration to say that the streets are "covered" in shit, they are not.

[PSPS]

11. As a very young child, I remember seeing public restrooms in downtown Portland

From: http://www.portlandmercury.com/BlogtownPDX/archives/2012/05/23/ye-olde-underground-loo

[Jesus Malverde]

14. Great pictures thanks for that....nt

[Prism]

13. Urine stank is how I know I'm at Civic Center!

I love living here. It's a very beautiful city, great food, great climate, great diversity of people.

But it is the most god awful smelling city I've ever encountered in America or Europe.

Certainly, many subway systems have the sharp scent of human piddle, but only in San Francisco does the yellow cloud permeate so fiercely out of doors.