470 Port a pods for 20,000 runners..??

One race where I felt like there were plenty of portajohns was the Boston Marathon. Even if 1/4 of the 20000 people wanted to pee at a given time, the lines would only be about 10 deep at each portajohn. It ain't a problem. Worry about the weather instead.

One race where I felt like there were plenty of portajohns was the Boston Marathon. Even if 1/4 of the 20000 people wanted to pee at a given time, the lines would only be about 10 deep at each portajohn. It ain't a problem. Worry about the weather instead.

What? Are you in waste management?

Can you say that again..?

Ive raced at Boston before and the town of Hopington has complained..there are not enough toilets.!!

A standard rule of thumb for races is one portable toilet for every 40 runners. If the 20,000 figure is correct, that would mean the 470 johns are just shy of the figure (500) given by aforementioned rule of thumb.

It doesn't really matter in the big picture considering how easy and socially acceptable it is to crap in your pants.

The problem has never been that there are not enough toilets. There are plenty of toilets. The problem has been that the toilets are not in the right place.

They have almost all the toilets in the Athlete's village. The problem is that for the half hour before the race, most everybody leaves that place and heads off to the starting corrals which are too far away. For that half hour, the toilets in the village stand almost completely unused while people near the start pee in the woods or on people's lawns.

So this year they're filling up a parking lot (normally used by buses) with toilets.

(By the way folks, not to get all anal-retentive on you or anything but it's not "Hopkington" or "Hopington". It is Hopkinton. No "g", I promise)

I was there last year and it was an eye-opening experience for this little southern boy. I mean there were women dropping their pants anywhere and everywhere because "They had to go" and there were not enough toilets and they were not in the right places. This is not a typical race that starts at 8 a.m. in the morning. You get bussed out to a field, sit around in the sun for anywhere from 3 to 5 hours waiting on a 12 o'clock start. All the while, nerves are buliding, you are drinking all the free water and gatorade they have everywhere...........which in my opinion changes the rule of thumb for "x" number of toilets for "x" number of runners. I think I "peed" at least 6 times while waiting and it was never on a port-ajohn as the lines were way too long.

Agreed...Bubba is correct..there are NOT enough toilets..if there were enough..you wouldnt have everyone peeing any and every place they can find

when i was at barcelona they had a pretty good set-up near the start - trough still urinals w/ plywood partitions. the portas were basically for women & dumpers. the urinal could easily serve 50 at a time, and it was very near the start and drained directly into the sewer. it was a good set-up, effective and discreet, and i've wondered why i haven't seen a similar set-up in the US.

The next time I go here is what I am going to do. I saw a few people do this, but was suprised there weren't more who were doing this.

Boston cost me about $1000 last year by the time I added together airfare, hotel, food, expo/souvenirs, registration fee, etc. So what is another $25. Go to Wal-Mart and buy the cheapest 2 man tent they have. It rolls up into a small bag that you can put into your duffle bag. If you don't want to mess with taking it down and sending it back on the busses, just fold it up and throw it away. You will get 3-5 hours of good use out of it.

Benefits:

1.Get yourself some bottles and you can zip up yourself into the privacy of your own bathroom.

2. Allows you to get out of the sun if it is sunny and warm like last year.

3. Gives you a concealed dressing room.

.....just a thought. I don't know if they prohibit this or not (better check first), but I did see 4 or 5 doing this last year.

The America's Finest City Half in San Diego had this about 10 years ago when I ran it. A huge trough behind some tarps. Not sure if they still do that, but was much better than standing in line for 10 minutes to use a porto-let for 30 seconds.

Boston needs to do something..its stupid

I was there last year too. And the year before. The lines were not too long unless you have no bladder control whatsoever.

Thats Bull S.... man! I have been there a lot recently, and every line has anywhere from a 15 to 45 minute wait! I doubt you have ever really been there.

The lines were very long..and took 30 minutes or more...way too long for people hydrating themselves before a marathon....

I agree.....I am not saying Average-Joe is wrong...but I sure wish I knew which part of the Athletes village he was camped out yet.

I promise folks, I was there. I wilted in that 70 degree heat. I think I even posted here about it.

I used the Porta-potties 3 times. Once was one of the few portapotties down closer to the Start by the parking lot where they are going to put a BUNCH of them this year. It was away from the Athletes Village. I waited about 10 minutes.

The second time I was in the village and I waited 20-25 minutes. I say it wasn't too long because if I wasn't in the line, I would have been sitting 100 feet away waiting anyway.

The last time was in the village about 10 minutes before the start. Everyone had left and I waited about 30 seconds.

What you fail to grasp is that your experience is NOT what many of us experienced...You are NOT the end all be all chief judge of pissing...obviously MANY runners have had problems because Runners are pissing wherever they can...This may come as a shock to your arrogant mindset but many other people here were there..and dont agree with you

I.P.Freely wrote:

You are NOT the end all be all chief judge of pissing

Gasp! I'm not? Shucks, all my illusions crushed.

...obviously MANY runners have had problems because Runners are pissing wherever they can...This may come as a shock to your arrogant mindset but many other people here were there..and dont agree with you

I already understood that they didn't agree with me. And I didn't agree with them. We both stated our positions and our reasons for them. Doing so does not make either of us arrogant. We simply disagree. That's how debate works, you see. Point and counter point.

Arrogance generally grows out of whiny aggrieved diatribes -- far to overwrought for the subject matter in question -- Such the post you just made. You need to chill out.