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Lifting Waits

Powder rooms, ladies' rooms, restrooms. Call them what you will, just make enough available for women in need, say members of the New York City Council, announcing a bill requiring public facilities to offer more lavatory amenities for women than men.

Powder rooms, ladies' rooms, restrooms. Call them what you will, just make enough available for women in need, say members of the New York City Council, announcing a bill requiring public facilities to offer more lavatory amenities for women than men.

Several cities and about a dozen states have instituted so-called "potty parity" laws to try to equalize the wait between the sexes for the bathroom. Women often face a tough choice: getting relief or viewing the second half of theater productions or sports events. Long restroom lines often prevent them from doing both.

New York's Restroom Equity Bill calls for a 2-to-1 ratio of women's to men's restrooms and would apply to new facilities or those undergoing major renovation. It would cover arenas, auditoriums, meeting halls, theaters, stadiums, public dance halls and bars. Yvette Clarke, a sponsor, says there are several reasons why women take longer in the loo, from wearing more clothes to tending to small children to the differences in "equipment" between the sexes.

Tennessee's law has resulted in a new lobby at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center with more bathrooms for women. Chicago's Soldier Field, home of the NFL Bears, was the first public works project affected by the city's 2001 law requiring roughly a 2-to-1 restroom facilities ratio.

Such laws have only been trickling in, but that may change soon. John F. Banzhaf III, professor of public interest law at George Washington University Law School, is preparing a lawsuit against a major facility, basing arguments on several court cases, that toilet inequity constitutes sex discrimination. He believes it isn't hard for places to make adjustments. Wolf Trap, a performing arts venue in Virginia, did so without renovations by changing one men's room to a women's room, creating a three-to-one ratio. "Men would zip in and out," Banzhaf says. "Now we all have lines but they're approximately equal."

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