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A wonderful way to spend 20p in Reading

I have a friend who confesses that her bottom has never, ever touched a public toilet seat

Brian Viner
Wednesday 28 August 2002 00:00 BST
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Last week I found myself in Reading Station needing a pee. That is not a sentence with which I ever expected to start a column, least of all as I made my way urgently across the concourse, with that vague sense of foreboding that precedes any visit to a British railway station loo: the strong whiff of urine, the dog-ends in the urinals, the broken locks, the crude drawings of penises above graffiti questioning Wayne's or Darren's sexuality... it's generally not a pleasant experience.

Imagine my delight, then, when I entered the Reading Station toilet to find a scrupulously clean, hi-tech space, lit with a soft blue glow, that would serve as a perfectly reasonable venue for a 21st birthday party. There was nothing bog-standard about it. The lock on the cubicle worked like a dream. There was no felt-tip willy on the wall. The aroma could not have been fresher.

So I decided to give the public loo a good press, since it has for so many years received nothing but bad. Just last week, in the mildly depressing Channel 4 documentary When Steptoe Met Son, came the reminder that Wilfrid Brambell, aka Albert Steptoe, was in 1962 found guilty of "importuning for immoral purposes" in a public loo. It's also where George Michael, looking for his Adonis, instead met his Nemesis. And when violence erupted at last weekend's Leeds music festival, it was the toilets that copped for it first.

The only downside to the men's loo at Reading Station is that it costs 20p to get in, through a little turnstile. I can't remember the last time I heard someone use that great British euphemism "to spend a penny" – but next time I do I'll be able to come over all pedantic with them.

Moreover, charging 20p has civil liberties implications. If you don't have 20p to spare, should you be denied the use of a nice, clean toilet? It's a question to exercise the finest legal minds.

And even those who can easily spare 20p sometimes object on principle to paying. I don't mind in the slightest, partly because I spent some of my formative years living in Paris, and slipping 20p into a slot is a sight easier than slipping past those fierce Parisian crones who used to sit behind saucers of 10 franc coins guarding restaurant toilets, much as Cerberus must have guarded Hades. (Incidentally, that's my third classical reference in a column about public loos, which must be some sort of record.)

But my brother-in-law Tony says he would rather hold it in than dig into his pocket for the pleasure of letting it out. While doing the washing-up on Bank Holiday Monday, in fact, Tony and I had an in-depth conversation about public toilets that verged on the philosophical.

It turned out that he's one of these hygienic types who watches with horror as men have a piddle and then leave without washing their hands. If there's a handle on the door, he then waits until someone comes in and keeps it open with his foot, rather than touch the handle himself. Which seems to me a tad over-zealous. But then, I do have another friend who cheerfully confesses that her bottom has never, ever come into contact with a public-toilet seat. She has perfected the art of hovering, which perhaps accounts for her impressive thigh muscles.

Indeed, you don't have to be George Michael to have a toilet anecdote. Tony also told me about the European vice-president of a company he once worked for, who used to pee and floss his teeth at the same time. No wonder he rose so high up the corporate ladder.

And I responded with the tale of when my first-born child Eleanor was but a few weeks old, and I carried her in her car seat into a cubicle in the gents' toilet of a service station on the M1. She was fast asleep, but just as I sat down she opened her eyes. "Hello, little sausage," I cooed. "Have you woken up?" I was then aware of the man in the adjoining cubicle leaving rather hurriedly, but, lost in adoring fatherhood, I didn't make the connection until later.

Speaking of making connections, I successfully did that at Reading Station, too. All in all, it was a singularly happy experience, and due credit needs to be given. I found out that Reading Station is owned by First Great Western, and so phoned them to offer my congratulations.

They told me proudly that they spent £400,000 on the concourse last year, and that the loo is staffed 18 hours a day. The 20p charge apparently covers the cost of staffing, and the soft blue lighting was introduced to discourage heroin users, whose veins don't show up in those conditions. This news came as a slight disappointment. I'd assumed that the lighting was simply to provide a mellow peeing environment. Nonetheless, I'm already looking forward to my next visit, and recommend it wholeheartedly.

b.viner@independent.co.uk

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