Flush with a new contract, more Portland Loos are coming
City will pay about $56,000 apiece for the new ones, much less than the prototype
The Portland Loo prototype on Northwest Fifth Avenue opened in early December. Four new loos will be built under a city contract with Lynch Mechanical Construction.
Tribune File Photo
Four more Portland Loos are on the way.
Portland Water Bureau officials plan to sign a contract worth about $230,000 in the next few days with Lynch Mechanical Construction LLC of Northwest Portland to build the four public toilets. One of them will be installed in the Pearl District’s Jamison Square area. The others could be placed around Old Town or in the Rose Quarter, but the city hasn’t made a decision on their locations.
Each of the toilets will cost about $56,919, considerably less than the estimated $140,000 the prototype cost to fabricate and install in Old Town last fall.
The actual contract, which must still be signed, is for $227,676. The city had budgeted $250,000 for the project and originally planned to build six new loos.
Mark Gunderson, Lynch Mechanical general manager, said the contract comes at a good time for his shop. His fabrication business usually has about 20 people in the field, but the sour economy has cut his work force to eight people, Gunderson said.
“That’s going to keep three or four people busy for a good month,” he said. “This came at the right time for us. Rest assured that we’re excited about the project.”
Assembling the pieces
Portland Loos are those 24-hour-a-day solar-powered public toilets fashioned to provide some privacy but also set up to discourage crime and vandalism. The first one was installed in early December at Northwest Fifth Avenue and Glisan Street in Old Town. It has been used a lot, but had some trouble during last winter’s heavy snow storm that knocked out the solar panels, shutting off lights and the automatic flush mechanism.
The metal structures are eight feet tall, 10.7 feet long and 6.7 feet wide. They meet Americans with Disabilities Act access requirements and have an outside water faucet for hand washing.
City Commissioner Randy Leonard came up with the idea for the public loo during a trip to Europe. There he saw a handful of similar public restrooms.
City officials hired Madden Fabrication of Northwest Portland to build the prototype using plans by CB Design and specifications set by the Water Bureau. Madden Fabrication had a crew of 12 working to produce the nearly 600 pieces that were eventually assembled into the loo.
At least we’re not in Seattle
In May, the city advertised for a company to build more of the restrooms. Of the three bidders (Madden Fabrication and R&J Metal Fabricators were the other two), Lynch Mechanical said it could build the new structures for $56,919 each. If the city built 10 of the loos, each would cost about $54,920. Want 20 or more? Those would each cost about $53,091, Gunderson said.
That’s a far cry from the $1 million-apiece high-tech self-cleaning, gadget-filled public restrooms the city of Seattle installed nearly five years ago around its downtown. The five restrooms were a big flop, costing about $140,880 each year to maintain and attracting crime. The toilets were eventually sold to a Rochester, Wash., race track for a total of $9,800.
Portland has received dozens of inquiries about its low-tech public restrooms, some from as far away as Australia. The city hopes to eventually build and sell the structures worldwide.
That’s just fine with Gunderson, who says work would begin on the new loos as soon as a contract is signed.
“We’re ready to build 1,000 of them,” he said.
kevinharden@portlandtribune.com