Officials of San Francisco copied the great idea in Hamburg, Germany. They now use urine-repellant paint. When you pee against a wall painted with it, your urine splashes back at you. Right back to your pants and shoes. That should teach you lesson big time, reports The Guardian, about this move to curb public urination.
They use Ultra-Ever Dry paint sold by Ultratech International, Inc. It is composed of the material, superhydrophobic coating that repels most liquids, pee included. When you pee against walls not painted with this material, you may also get splash back urine but you get much more if the wall you pee against has this anti-wee paint.
San Francisco's Director of Public Works, Mohammed Nuru, explains that aside from using the anti-wee paint, they are also complementing it with an information campaign encouraging pedestrians to use pit stops instead of urinating in bus stops or sidewalks. The message is 'Hold it! Seek relief in appropriate place.'
Since this program was started last week, they have finished 9 walls. Many more neighborhoods have been requesting for it. The city pushed around some numbers, and realized it was cheaper to use this paint than pay workers to clean after urinated areas, plus the stench is just unbearable. The paint can last a year, although it is susceptible to abrasion than can lessen the splash back effect.
This anti-wee paint as first used in Hamburg, Germany early this year. The streets of central St. Pauli are lined with bars and clubs. When you have drunk men around, foul-smelling urine abound. They pee against houses, and the residents have been complaining. They used information campaign, posted prohibitions and even levied fines. It just did not work. So they took upon themselves to find the solution - the anti-wee paint. Since then, the incidents of public urination have lowered.
