As an engineer, I can tell you that it is cost prohibitive to build something with tight fitting doors, particularly where some asshole is likely to destroy them anyway. Have you ever seen a door in a public crapper that wasn't kicked in or jimmied? Except in Japan where people are civilized and the stall doors do shut with no gaps.

1) Ease of cleaning is one consideration, at least from the standpoint of partition heights (the seeing feet issue). Janitors need to get their mops all around the floor surfaces to keep gunk from accumulating.

2)There is also the matter of ventilating the area. Solid, phone booth-like structures are more difficult to air out and are more susceptible to mold and mildew.

3)I have seen stalls without cracks, and the engineering involves adding more stainless steel. I can tell you from considering stainless steel facilities in the new house I'm building that they are very expensive. The more you use, the more it costs. Cracks may be more a matter of cost-saving measures than anything else.

4)And then there's this: it's a bit more difficult to engage in any sort of untoward behavior (such as drug use and public masturbation) behind less-than-airtight compartments. One morbid thought: if someone, God forbid, should die inside a down to the floor partition with no cracks, it would be more difficult to detect.

My gut feeling on all of this is that most public facilities are designed to make it easier to clean them. Making small concessions to privacy (which would probably bother only the chronically Shameful) seems reasonable to me.

Also, it helps to be able to see whether there is really anybody in the stall if the door is closed.

TBW says, "I have seen stalls without cracks." Regrettably, TBW, I have seen cracks without stalls.

Oh, my! Didn't you just return from a weekend with three women, you insatiable satyr, you?

The cracks are slightly unavoidable...but there are ways around it...like going in a far stall so that people won't accidently see you in there.
But there is also this unspoken bathroom code that all humans follow where they will not look inside of the cracks to see if there is really a person inside. It's strange, but sometimes that is all you have to go for. Personally, I avoid public bathrooms because I can't stand the thought of wondering who had their ass there last and where it had been before. ew.

No, it was five women, but the whole thing turned out to be a lot more entertaining from a PoopReport than from a Playboy perspective. I am posting my diary of the trip on the forums for your voyeuristic viewing pleasure.

Helluva note, when you go off for an orgy and the best memories are connected with the toilet. Shows that I really do belong here, I guess!

Dave, Ms. Morgan sent you some printed material? It wasn't written in urine, was it? Be careful man, you never know what a cat like that will send you in the mail now that she has your address.

I'd hate to see one of her Christmas cards.

I wonder about the engineering theory. It seems that the most seemless crappers are the port-a-pottys. They strike me as being very inexpensive and durable.

SamDamnit!
President in Exile
of Poopreportia
http://www.myspace.com/saintcarnivean

But, Sam, they are always intended for single users by design. We're not talking about single use public facilities here. There is no privacy problem with a lockable, single-user facility.

I'm just picturing a bunch of port-a-potty frames dropped over toilets in a public bathroom. It seems like they would take up just as much space. They could be bolted to the floor.

SamDamnit!
President in Exile
of Poopreportia
http://www.myspace.com/saintcarnivean

Most modern built loos now have completely partitioned off stalls. In most cities in Europe, except the UK, stalls are very private. But even now, the stalls in the UK are beginning to be self-contained.

I do notice in most airports, though, there are gaps. May be it is cheaper to leave gaps.

I do agree with the big wiper, ventilation is a problem!!!

As someone who has worked in the metal fabrication industry cost is the #1 overriding factor in the design of stalls. Seamless corners are very expensive to produce as well the transportation of one piece constructions also becomes prohibitive. It's much simpler to manufacture and transport flat pieces requiring minimal hardware to assemble. Most stall walls fall well short of reaching the floor because it complicates cleaning and adds unnecessary expense in added materials.

If you visit some finer restaurants and hotels you may come upon structures made in faux stone and marble which are seamless but this is usually an indication that your bill for services will be commensurate with the decor.

OK, seamless corners are hard. I can buy that. What about partitions that go all the way down? I don't buy that it's for "ease of cleaning" because they have to mop each stall anyway to get behind the toilet. Cleaning people are going into each stall no matter what.

Right you are Dave but remember the partitions are painted mild steel sometimes galvanized steel (more corrosion resistant and more $)and moisture along with the solvents used in cleaning will cause corrosion, also if the wall goes to the bottom you will now have an area that is difficult to clean (the crack at the bottom), by having the bottom open the cleaner is free to sweep his mop from side to side with no encumbrances, he doesn't have to take care, just back and forth and he's done and move on to the next. If there is a wall or joint it acts as a trap for not only water and cleaning solvents but piss and shit, you want to minimize the time and effort the cleaner spends returning the facilities to a pristine condition.

I've been in one of those marble floor-to-ceiling stalls and the feelings of luxury and privacy were superseded by the fact that enclosed spaces make shit smell BAD, and shitting in a tiny space in general is a bit disconcerting. At least a stall gives the illusion that you are shitting in a larger area.

It is the old liberty vs. security argument: The more you have of one, the less you have of the other.

The doors going all the way down will catch all sorts of stuff underneath. No matter how much you mop on one side, the dirt trapped under the bottom of the door will just be redeposited when you close the door again.

If ya think of it, the bathroom IS the place for Cracks! Door cracks, wall cracks, floor cracks, and most importantly Butt Cracks!

Have a Crappy Day!! Poop Shooter!

Except for Freud's Beard and Model Forms, Ms. Morgan's "art" is really crappy and belongs in the scrap yard... IMHO :-)

As far as cracks in the stalls, I rather like them. I especially like to look at other women's feet and try to determine weather they are sitting or standing. Just one of my silly little quirks.

Flying out of Philly in the AM so I'll have to take note of the facilities and give a report when I get down in FLA.

Toodles!

A country girl~

Have fun in the Philly airport. That place is ghetto. I was there last June and there was a giant mess of turds in one of the toilets by the baggage claim. The bathrooms there also have instructions on the ass gaskets. Apparently people who fly in and out of Philly are quite stupid.

If you're going to Miami, that airport is much nicer. Bravo for Miami. I do believe it was there that I was in a bathroom that had stalls that went all the way down. I could be wrong about that, though.

The nicest airport I have been in though, regardless of size, is the Cancun airport. The nicest plane I have been on belonged to Mexicana Airlines. It was the only plane that didn't smell like ass. The Mexicans apparently know something we don't when it comes to air travel (or maybe I just got lucky).

Try taking a dump at banks or in upscale office buildings, they generally have nice doors with private rooms for the shitters.

A new building where I once had an office had 1 set of bathrooms per floor. The handicapped stall had a full door and it was a room. My buddies and I called it the "executive shitter". Funny thing was it was always in use too. We would go from floor to floor to find an open executive shitter. The odor did seem to hang around though since the door was often closed.

AB2K + Mexico = The following story, obscurely posted on the forums, but which needs to be told for ALL THE WORLD TO KNOW:

"All right, Dumpster, I'll air my dirty laundry about the Mexican bathingsuit under this thread. It fits under here pretty well.

"When I went to Cancun this summer, I forgot my damn bathingsuit. As most of the people who hear this story say, only I could forget something like that. I went to the Mexican Wal-Mart, because the idea of that cracked me up so much I had to see it for myself, to procure a new one, as well as some Mexican desodorante (yes, we forgot our deodorant too) and some underwater cameras. We took a cab and it was expensive, so I was in a hurry to shop fast. I found a bathingsuit I liked, a two-piece tankini, and the tag said CH-XG. In hindsight, that means chica-extra grande (small to extra large) and only indicated the range of sizes said swimwear came in. It did not actually indicate the size of the bathingsuit. I only paid attention to the XG and thought, "Extra grande, that'll keep my breasteses reined in." I did not even look at the label.

"Only after we got back to the hotel did I discover that the bathingsuit was MEDIUM. I thought it felt a little snug going on. It fit, albeit snugly, in every other area, but my boobs just oozed out of this thing. If I bent over, Mr. Blaster would bend over with me and try to see nipple. Sure, I could have spent another 200 pesos on a cab ride to Wal-Mart and returned it, or went to the expensive tourist mall across the street and spent 400 or 500 pesos on another, but fuck it, we were only going to be there a week, so I paraded my cleavage around like crazy every time we went to the beach. One of my favorite things is swimming in the ocean, and when I did that Mr. Bastard, err, Blaster, videotaped me getting out of the water, when the waves had pulled down my bathingsuit and exposed cleavage bigger than a baby's behind. When we got home he uploaded that video to the computer and captured still shots of it. If he ever shares those, I will kill him."

Mr. Blaster, the rest of us can only dream....

AB2K, being somewhat over-endowed in the chest area myself, I completely empathize with this story, even though it was not purposely posted on this thread by you. Clothing that fits the rest of me produces eye-popping cleavage, which causes Gomez to exclaim in a dumbstruck voice, "BOOBS!" He will do this no matter where we are or who's around, and he always sounds very pleased and excited as if he'd forgotten about them and was receiving an unexpected surprise. Then he periodically conducts a visual inspection to make sure they're still there and reminds me every few minutes that, and I quote, "YOU are having BOOBS."

Although amusing to watch his IQ plummet to single digits, I find it rather cute and endearing that he still is entranced with them after all this time. It sounds like you have a very devoted Mr. Blaster there, congratulations.

Back on topic, the other day at work I was in a stall peeing when some lady walked by and put her face up to the crack in the stall and peered in! Yes, I swear! She even cupped her hands around her eyes as she strained to see through the crack who was in there! I was speechless with horror at this shocking breach of commonly accepted etiquette, and rather than Astairing or saying "excuse me" or something, I began kicking the stall door furiously, which sent her scuttling away, hopefully with a bruise developing on her forehead. Since then I've tried to figure out who it was, but no luck.

Not only is it a cleaning and safety issue, having cracks in stalls is a security issue. Think about this: a criminal goes into the bathroom and hides in a stall. Which kind would allow a quicker find? Same idea with emergency situations: Speed will override every time.

juiop: a juicy poop

Most public bathrooms have floor drains and floors are ever-so-slightly graded to allow water to reach the drain. If the stalls were completely enclosed, the water from an overflowing toilet would fill up the stall until some unlucky sap opened the door.

Picture that!

Everybody likes boobies.

Nobody likes stalls with privacy robbing gaps.

What if there are boobies behind the privacy robbing gaps?

I work at at a helicopter company in Fort Worth, Texas. I am a neutral shitter; not shameless nor shameful. Anyway... it is not uncommon to enter the men's restroom and be able to tell who is taking a shit! The gap between the stalls and doors is 0.34" +/- 0.25" However, I dunno if Texan's are generally shameless, but the shitters seem to be in high demand. Sometimes guys are lined up waiting, including myself. The other day, just by glancing, I noticed my coworker was in there pinching a loaf. I sat down for a smooth crap yesterday and noticed another coworker walk by and I swear I made eye contact with him!!! I didn't mind... I wish pooing wouldn't be so overated!! Peeing is a way to eliminate waste and so is pooing. The only difference is that one is solid and one is liquid. So why aren't there stalls for a urinal? Being private about poo is silly!!! It is a thing of the past. Sex used to be extremely private years ago and now it is not. I say remove the stalls and dump your intestines like a man!

C Everett nailed it...(dammit)
Logistics....
I cant believe I agreed with him on something.
Left brain or right?????
(OK...Im a [programmerrr.nerd.withmethod])

BTW....I try NOT to look thru the gaps.
Its OPEN or its NOT!

Asphincter says WHAT...(!)

In 1968 I took basic training at Fort Knox Kentucky. The barraks were built around WW2, and the latrines not only didn't have stalls, there was no partition between the pots and the sinks. It was convenient to shameless shitters like myself. You could bum a smoke from your neighbor, request a courtesy flush, or even converse with someone who was shaving.
It was a problem for shameful shitters who found it impossible to use the facilities. I don't know what he did, but one told me he didn't use it for the entire 8 weeks.

Stalls? WE DON'T NEED NO STINKING STALLS!

As a sufferer from mild claustrophobia, I hate being in a stall with no gaps anywhere. Air and light is what I need when I take a shit. No stalls? That's fine by me, 3flusher. I believe public restrooms should be built with some toilets with stalls and some without. Shameless satisfied, shameful satisfied. How about that, guys?

Why would a business spend the money to totally enclose the crappers when they add no value to the business? Let the shy pussies go home to shit!

C Everrett may be sick, politically speaking, but he is not dumb. And besides, it's fun to rag him about his politics.

TSV, a car's gotta have brakes as well as an engine.

3flusher: I'm not sure those who are Shameful can understand the lack of concern those of us who are Shameless and who may have grown up with open stalls either at camp, school or in the military have about using that type of facility.

At any rate, we certainly have no problem using closed stalls with cracks or off-the-floor partitions. In this area of bathroom behavior, I don't think the twain shall ever meet.

I think typically it's a function of price vs. privacy. The high-end casinos in las vegas all have very private stalls, but most everywhere else has the standard stall. When you spend over a billion dollars on a building you can have private stalls.

I don't mind the gap under the door and walls. If someone gets stuck in there, the can crawl out. If you run out of toilet paper, it makes it easier for someone to pass you some.
It's the gaps at the top and the big cracks between the door and partition that are pointless to me.

its a dam* conspiracy. In hopes that people will become more comfortable with their homosexuality our terrible abomination of a presidents thought making the crapper less private would promote all them gay crackas. YA HEARD!

Wise Janitor: HUH?

Have a Crappy Day!! Poop Shooter!

Well, look at it this way. He doesn't want to get caught in the act.

If this is the wise janitor, I sure don't want to meet the dumb one.

Don't be so bashful. Take your shit like a man.

I used to work in a building with private stalls and I loved taking a crap at work. I also used to masturbate on my breaks. And one lady was always snorting coke in the main area of the bathroom...so maybe privacy doesn't matter?

"And one lady was always snorting coke in the main area of the bathroom..." while you were in there masturbating? Must have been a unisex bathroom, because I don't know too many women who masturbate on their work breaks. I could use to be educated, but I gather satisfactory female masturbation is a bit more complex than that.

I had diarrhea at work today... I was hoping more people would have been in the bathroom to hear it! It had a lot of volume, a little noise, and a bowel emptying feeling. I wish I had stools like that 3 or 4 times a day, everyday!!!

Poo Zombie--LOL at your comment! I love that you just started kicking at the door! The only other choice would have been to say, "Occupied!" in a nasty tone of voice, but I, too, would have been rendered mute by the shock of some idiot eyeballing me through the crack! She had it comin'!

On the other hand, when DD and DS got too big to come IN the stall with me, but were too small to wait outside, I made them put their bums against the door of the stall and told them to "Keep your feet where I can see 'em!". This way, I knew they weren't wandering off, and yet it precluded having a small eyeball peeping through the crack at a, shall we say, inopportune moment. Worked great! (Still does, for DS when his big sister isn't with us)

GGG, that's a humorous but well thought-out solution. The presence of your children (who would look sort of like sentries, I imagine) would ensure that bathroom users keep a polite distance and refrain from engaging in Turd Terrorism or otherwise making a mess of the bathroom. At the same time, it prevents your kids from either peeping at you or bothering other bathroom users. Great idea!

Thanks! Yeah, it's amazing what one end of your body can think of, fast, when the other end insists!

My sophomore year at Ohio University was spent in Gamerstfelder Hall. Gam, as it was called, had shitters (at least in '95) with doors that only came up about neck high of a squatter. So when you walked in you'd see a floating head in a box, I guess like Jambie. The vantage point of the shitter would be of the back of the person wazzing in the urinal.

Of course, there was one shitter with no door. I avoided that one...

Why can't they make a stall that doesn't have half an inch of peeping space between every panel and the door?

_______
"Double the flush, double the fun" --The Amazing Anus

Back to the original problem....CEP and Bunga are right, it`s all to with cost, ease of construction, assembly and practicalities. As someone who has bought for our company hundreds of cubicles from many different suppliers - they still cost at least $600 a stall, minimum quality.

On another note - particularly to Dave - I`m not sure what kind of artist this Ms Morgan is (installation crap I assume, of no merit), but do you realise that it was a Belgian, Marcel Duchamp, who first started all this installation art bullshit off. Which has ended up with someone paying millions of dollars for a pickled shark by Damian Hirst, a charlatan who passes himself off as an artist. Marcel Duchamp, in the 30`s I think, exhibited a urinal (plain white porcelain, signed R Mutt) in a national exhibition. The first poop artist, in a way.

One way to seal off the "stall door crevices" is to put some sort of a flexible rubber strip at the hinge side, and a metal strip on the lock side of the door.

100% private stalls could lead to explicit behavior (IE: drugs, masturbation, smoking, sex, etc).
_______
"-55F, a new record low? Nope, thermometer went bad. Looks like -50F still stands"

"100% private stalls could lead to explicit behavior (IE: drugs, masturbation, smoking, sex, etc)."

So what? As long as you're not being forced to do those things, why do you care what other people use privacy for?

Just sayin'...

I agree GGG! Who cares what others do behind closed doors! Although I will admit to engaging in some explicit behavior in a bathroom that had no gaps in it...hey,atleast it was with my husband & we didn't disturb anyone.