In 1998 a (
female)
Industrial Design student from the
Delft University of Technology, Marian Loth, designed a urinal for women as her
graduation project. The idea arose when one of her
friends told her she'd been to the
North Sea Jazz Festival and had had to wait for the toilet for hours. She then went to the men's toilet and used the urinal there, which went surprisingly well. They had a discussion about why no urinals exist for women, since that would make things go much faster.
Loth says: "In the preliminary research we found out that many women postpone their visit to the toilet as long as possible, because thay hate to go to public toilets so much. Most women don't want to touch the toilet seat, and as a precaution, they squat above it. Thus, a seat on a urinal for women would be useless."
The ladies' urinal is designed especially for the squatting position that women assume in public toilets anyway, so you're not supposed to sit on it. Contrary to what's usual for men's urinals, women using the women's urinal face the bathroom area. In this position nothing 'private' is visible to other visitors (yes it has been tested). Also the idea is to put a screen around the urinal to prevent exposure from the sides.
The idea of the design is to shorten rows at public ladies' bathrooms, so it should be faster to use the women's urinal than to use a normal toilet. I have my doubts... especially in the night life, which is the main target industry for this new urinal, many women wear elaborate and/or tight clothing, that takes much more time to take off than it actually takes to do what you came there for. Plus, personally I would not want to be seen peeling off my tight rubber pants.... ;)
Source: http://www.delta.tudelft.nl/delta/online/zoek.htm. Search for 'urinoir', the article is called "IO studente ontwerpt urinoir voor vrouwen". You can also find a picture of the urinal there or at http://www.io.tudelft.nl under showcases: damesurinoir