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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Therefore, the situations at sightseeing spots in tourist areas, Hong Kong Cultural Centre and Victoria Park are rather similar. My suggestion for improvement is that we should have more cubicles in female toilets and also provide longer urinal troughs for men's toilets, i.e. to provide more toilet facilities as a solution to the waiting problem.
MR. WU CHI-wai (in Cantonese):—Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask whether there is any standard specifications for cubicles in public toilets of UC venues in general. In fact, it has been reported in the newspaper that there are only two cubicles in the female toilet in the Science Museum. As members of the general public, we can hardly imagine such things to happen. So, is there any standard specifications for toilet cubicles in UC venues? Also what volume of visitor flow can 2 female cubicles cope with? Is there a norm for toilets in UC venues? This may have nothing to do with the survey findings, but I wish to know whether we have a minimum standard.
CHAIRMAN (in Cantonese):—The Science Museum is another kind of facility. When the Museum was being designed, the Working Group on Public Toilets had not yet been set up. Nevertheless, when a design was turned into the facility, even in the Hong Kong Cultural Centre or Academy of Performing Arts which have the most successful designs, people still have to wait for their turn to use the toilet. So when the Hong Kong Museum of History is constructed in future, we must pay attention to the design of toilets and see whether they can properly cope with the demand arising from a large visitor flow. Therefore, we should not try to reduce the toilet area in the designs. Now let me answer your question: we haven't taken into account the visitor flow in designing toilets for the Science Museum, and there wasn't any survey finding to facilitate the design.
MR. WU CHI-WAI (in Cantonese):-I would like to follow-up on the above question. Shall we expand the existing toilet facilities in UC venues?
CHAIRMAN (in Cantonese):-The Working Group on Public Toilets has a work schedule. In the first phase we will renovate all the free-standing toilets. This phase of the project has been proceeding well. In the second phase, consideration will be given to renovating and improving toilets in markets. To go further, I think we should improve the toilets in venues such as the Hong Kong Cultural Centres, the Science Museum, other museums and other venues. However, there is one constraint regarding this. Since the Hong Kong Cultural Centre and the Science Museum had already been built, there will be practical difficulties in expanding the toilets as other facilities may have to be deleted in order to yield space for toilets.
Mr. Lai Hok-lim (in Cantonese):—Mr. Chairman, I would like to follow-up on the point of venue you have just mentioned. It has been learnt that in the Science