Cary Tyson is Executive Director of Portland Downtown, the nonprofit organization working to strengthen the vitality of downtown Portland, Maine. A longtime leader in downtown and place management, his work brings together economic development, advocacy, events, public-space activation, and partnerships that support local businesses while reinforcing downtown as the civic, cultural, and economic heart of the community.

London Loo Tours turns the humble toilet into a lens for exploring urban history. The walking-tour company leads visitors through London’s public conveniences, sanitation infrastructure, social customs, and wonderfully peculiar restroom stories—revealing how something every city needs can tell surprisingly rich stories about the city around it.

The Tokyo Toilet brought leading architects and designers together to rethink one of the most ordinary pieces of public infrastructure: the neighborhood restroom. Built across Shibuya, the project uses architecture, accessibility, maintenance, and design to challenge assumptions about public toilets and create facilities people can trust and enjoy.

The Hundertwasser Toilets turned a small public restroom in Kawakawa, New Zealand, into an unlikely civic landmark. Designed by artist and architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser using recycled materials, colorful ceramics, organic forms, and living vegetation, they demonstrate how even the most utilitarian public infrastructure can become an expression of place.

Bowl Plaza in Lucas, Kansas, turns the public restroom into roadside attraction, public artwork, and community project all at once. Covered in elaborate mosaics and shaped with a healthy sense of humor, it offers an exuberant answer to a rarely asked city-making question: why shouldn't the bathroom be memorable?

Claire Salter, better known as Curious Claire, is a London-based travel writer and blogger with a particular affection for the quirky, unexpected, and easily overlooked things that give places their character.

Portland Downtown is the nonprofit downtown organization working to strengthen the economic vitality, character, and experience of Portland, Maine’s city center. Serving the downtown district through programs including clean and safe services, business support, marketing, events, advocacy, and public-space initiatives, the organization works with businesses, residents, property owners, cultural institutions, and community partners to keep downtown Portland vibrant, welcoming, and distinctly its own.

Portland Downtown’s Public Restroom Master Plan makes the case that toilets are essential urban infrastructure. Connecting restroom access to walkability, public health, tourism, aging, accessibility, dignity, and inclusion, it lays out a strategy for creating and maintaining a more welcoming downtown.

This book is Number One in addressing the politics of where we’re allowed to go in public. Adults don’t talk about the business of doing our business. We work on one assumption: the world of public bathrooms is problem- and politics-free. No Place To Go: How Public Toilets Fail our Private Needs reveals the opposite is true.

Lezlie Lowe is an author, strategist, consultant, and journalist; a professional communicator with decades of experience. Her work, voice, and the issues she amplifies often centre on urbanism, gender dynamics, and the intersection of the personal and the political.