Risk management for urinals

After my first article for the Harlequin was about a rather neglected topic, i.e. toilet seats, it is time to look again at something somewhat neglected by the public: the urinal. Although not all readers can boast of personal experience in this context, the topic seems at least comprehensible to inexperienced third parties.

I recently had the opportunity of engaging in some sporting activities in the south of Portugal. I had never been to this part of Portugal before and I had not visited the other parts for a long time. This may explain my astonishment when I found the following model of one of the toilets belonging to the sports ground, whose design was unusual for Switzerland. I was however, immediately struck by the fact that certain unsavoury side effects of the models used in Switzerland were at least less frequent with this model. The initiated among us know the problem of splashback next to and under the urinal. “Applied risk management,” my project manager heart rejoiced. “They must be good project managers, the Portuguese – and they use negative experiences to make improvements. “

I was all the more surprised when I found the following model on the next of the golf course we played.

My confidence in the quality of Portuguese risk management was shaken. Curious, I went to the toilet on the next course to establish a provisional Portuguese model tendency. The pendulum swung back in the direction of risk aversion, even if the function of the waste bin next to it remained a mystery to me.

On the fourth course we played, the tendency was consolidated by a model that was very close to the first one shown.

And to top it all off, just 4 days after my return, an article on the pros and cons of different urinal shapes, conducted by the University of Waterloo (hopefully this is not an omen), appeared on www.derstandard.de under the title “Science Seeks and Finds the Perfect Urinal”.

The winner is: the second from the right – and the Portuguese are really risk-aware.

Original text: RGE
English translation: BCO