A plan which the Bay Citizen says is still in "early development" would take street parking spaces in neighborhoods where the homeless tend to defecate (the T-loin, alleys in SoMa) and turn them into "pooplets" by installing new-fangled public toilets. Though we're not getting a glimpse into the design of the things just yet, they apparently would separate liquid and solid waste (which is said to make them less smelly?) and collect waste for use as possible fertilizer. Also, they might be translucent, with some sort of frosted glass sides that would allow police to monitor activity within them, so they don't become hidey-holes for drug use and prostitution like all the other public toilets have. Also, the washing stations would be on the outside. There is quite a problem, you see, with our streets and sidewalks being used as toilets, and some ambitious designers and planners believe this is the solution. (See poop incidence map below.)

There were 10,000 separate "incidents" of human feces reported in the Tenderloin last year alone! Interestingly, someone has been tracking the number of shit-cleanup "incidents" in and around the Tenderloin over the course of last year. Below, you can see the map showing hot spots of such "incidents," and thus we learn that the shittiest of all shit spots in San Francisco is... wait for it ... Dodge Alley near Turk and Larkin, which clocked 123 separate piles of human feces in 2010. Congratulations Dodge Alley, you are the Tenderloin's most favorite unofficial toilet. The doorway at Continental Mail Co. (537 Jones) comes in a close second.

[Bay Citizen]