Swiss rest rooms cleanliness and costs?

  • Removed user
    Participant
    72625 posts
    8 August 2018 at 0:21:02 #817749

    Just curious if the public rest rooms, lavatory facilities, charge a fee to use in all areas of Switzerland. Say the rail stations or other public places have rest rooms? And if there are charges.

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    Peterli
    Participant
    1206 posts
    8 August 2018 at 3:36:09 #893626

    They are very clean (perhaps not up to Japanese standards) and there are no charges.

    Removed user
    Participant
    72625 posts
    8 August 2018 at 6:29:33 #893627

    I know the restrooms in Zurich train station have a cost to use them – maybe 1-2chf I think. I’d always try to keep some Swiss franc coins on you at all times to be safe.

    Most tourist locations (mountains etc) don’t have any cost though.

    Gunzel
    Participant
    241 posts
    8 August 2018 at 7:05:48 #893628

    There was a charge at Thun station when I used the facilities in 2015.

    Snowman
    Participant
    825 posts
    8 August 2018 at 7:10:44 #893629

    At train stations, there is a cost. As Lucas says in post below, 1 to 2 CHF. Slot machine, so have coins. When threr is a charge, it is clean.

    For location, try the app “WC-Guide”.

    Removed user
    Participant
    72625 posts
    8 August 2018 at 10:34:33 #893630

    Thank you all for your prompt replies.

    Peterli
    Participant
    1206 posts
    8 August 2018 at 23:58:21 #893631

    Hello Snowman,

    Thank you for clarifying that there is a cost to use a WC in a train station. I can’t remember the last time I even looked for a WC in a Swiss railway station. I do know that there are free WC facilities at the fuel and food stops along the autoroutes, and also rest stops, and in any commercial centre (shopping mall) that I have visited. I was unaware of the WC-Guide you mentioned, and so I checked out the website and compared what it shows to what I know there is in the area around Neuchâtel, and it certainly shows far more than I was aware of or have used. Further afield, I see that the one at the NE end of Lac des Taillères (near La Brévine) is there so I am impressed. I checked to see if there was a “urinoir” in the canton and found none. But I did find one in the Ticino, on the Via Moretto, in Cureglia, and two in the city of Zurich, but not the one I was looking for. This WC guide can be consulted in English, German, French, and Italian and so I am glad that you have brought it to everybody’s attention.

    I assume that the major Swiss airports (Kloten and Cointrin) both have free WC facilities but I will leave this to those who are more frequent users. I now exclusively use the EuroAirport at Basel/Mulhouse and can report that they are both free and clean.

    Peterli
    Participant
    1206 posts
    9 August 2018 at 0:09:11 #893632

    PS: Here is the one in Zurich that is not in the WC-Guide. This was reported in Dezeen a few years ago so perhaps it is no longer there, near the Renaissance Hotel off the Pfingstweidstrasse. http://www.dezeen.com/2015/08 /18/bureau-a-fountain-2017-pink-marble-urinal-pissoir-zurich-car-park/ I think I would try to hold it until I got into the hotel. 😉

    Removed user
    Participant
    72625 posts
    9 August 2018 at 0:25:41 #893633

    Thank you for your posts. I had no idea what WC (water closet) referred to. Just room with toilet. Ignorant American who hasn’t been to Europe. Now I know. Here we called them rest rooms and various other names. Thanks again, very informative as always.

    Gunzel
    Participant
    241 posts
    9 August 2018 at 0:40:06 #893634

    WC is widely used in Europe. Probably unknown to Americans who prefer “bathroom”. In Australia, toilet is more common but if one wants to be more formal “lavatory” is a suitable (if not somewhat old fashioned) term. “Dunny” was Australian slang. Not so common now.

    Of course, and I can only speak from my own experience, but there is always the “sympathetic tree”. Not sure of the legalities but for males in mature/senior years sometimes the only option; with absolute discretion of course. Prevention is better than cure?

    Peterli
    Participant
    1206 posts
    9 August 2018 at 2:15:55 #893635

    Ha ha, I lived for part of one Winter near Villars in canton Vaud, and I knew a British girl there who referred to the WC as the “loo”.

    JohnYorks
    Participant
    117 posts
    10 August 2018 at 20:22:44 #893636

    Hi Sporty 56

    I can confirm, being a male of superannuated age and having returned from a recent megatrip to Switzerland where I travelled on 130 trains, that I tested the toilet / WC facilities on Swiss stations (and trains) to perfection (I wanted to say to destruction, but that would give the wrong impression).

    The charges are inconsistent – some larger and intermediate stations (Buchs, for example) , make a charge of 1SF, but a great many have very nice ‘loos’ without any charge. (You’ll notice the British term here, Peterli – it’s now so common in UK that it has probably replaced toilet and has definitely replaced WC, lavatory and pubic convenience in common speech. Every one of these terms is historically a euphemism, the US ‘bathroom’ being another example)! Spiez has no charge, nor do Interlaken Ost, Poschiavo, St Gallen (up several flights of stairs next to the Migros restaurant), Appenzell, Pontresina, Chur, Aigle, Yverdon-les~Bains and a host of small stations with good facilities, such as the memorable loo at Langwies on the Arosa line, where you cross the station yard to a distant door, or the Gents’ at lofty Alp Grüm, perched improbably at the end of the platform. My favourite was definitely at Leissigen,between Interlaken and Spiez (a peach of a village, by the way), where the facility is the cutest little cottage in the station yard. At Brig (1SF charge), there was something wrong with the payment mechanism, so the general advice from the station staff was – just push the door and go in.

    Loos are always so clean. Kandersteg is particularly pristine. At the said Leissigen, at 9.00 on a Sunday morning, a railway van was driven into the yard, the driver got out, fetched a bucket and cleaning stuff from the back, disappeared into the cottage, then reappeared and drove off. That’s service!

    When there’s building work going on at stations (when isn’t there?), such as at Poschiavo and Lugano recently, portable loos with the delightful title ‘ToiToi’ are arranged in multiple to give you a wide choice of venue. Only the quietest branch line halts and stations seem to have no toilet facilities.

    As for trains – almost all have a WC aboard, and they are kept in good order too.

    Another reason to love Switzerland!

    John

    Slowpoke
    Participant
    7567 posts
    10 August 2018 at 21:02:56 #893637

    The word “toilet” works for me, as far as I recall, everywhere I have been in Europe.

    The American “rest room” is not very clear in it’s meaning, if translated literally. Nor is “bathroom.”

    Although I have found the toilet facilities on most trains to be clean, there was a thread here a few years ago in which someone had found the opposite. Apparently, there is a phone number to call in those circumstances…..but, they certainly happen only rarely.

    At Zürich airport, the toilets are free.

    Has it been renamed Kloten? Arno will attest that it is a word with somewhat vulgar meaning in Dutch. A few years ago, the airport was renamed “Unique.” Kloten is correct, of course, because it is the name of the Swiss village or Gemeinde in which the airport is located.

    What is the official name today, I wonder?

    Sadly, the almost universal availability of toilets at smaller RR stations has pretty much disappeared. Vandalism is the excuse. And, those stations are no longer manned………bit it even has happened at manned stations.

    That “app” sounds useful, more than ever.

    Slowpoke

    .

    JohnYorks
    Participant
    117 posts
    10 August 2018 at 21:52:40 #893638

    Sadly, the almost universal availability of toilets at smaller RR stations has pretty much disappeared. Vandalism is the excuse. And, those stations are no longer manned………bit it even has happened at manned stations.

    What you say about the RR is interesting, Slowpoke. (Rhaetian Railway?) On my recent trip, I thought I detected that quite a severe demanning programme had been effected since my previous trip in 2012, most surprisingly at Filisur, I think (though there’s still a nice little café there, and toilets). At Brusio the station was neat and tidy, but the post office within the station and other services seem to have disappeared, and there was what looked like a permanent sign ‘closed’. I can’t be sure, but I think there may still in May have been toilet facilities at Miralago, and there definitely were at Langwies (and I think Litzirüti), Alp Grüm, Cavaglia, Poschiavo and Tirano. However, there was nowhere any sign of vandalism – far from it.

    One sad realisation for me was that a little halt I intended to use, at Privilasco, between Cavaglia and Poschiavo, was closed a few months before my visit. The halt’s tiny hut of a waiting room is still there, but the sign has gone and a ticket inspector confirmed that it was closed. This seems like such a rare event in Switzerland – does anyone know of further recent permanent closures on the RR or elsewhere? It would have made possible a tempting stroll into Poschiavo.

    John

    Slowpoke
    Participant
    7567 posts
    10 August 2018 at 22:20:13 #893639

    <<“What you say about the RR is interesting, Slowpoke. (Rhaetian Railway?) “>>

    I’ve noticed it in the Emmental, where I’ve hiked or walked for years.

    I don’t know about closed stations so much as closed rai,l lines, also inthe Emmental.

    Some years ago, the loop around the Napf was interrupted (buses fill in) at Affltern- Weir and north to Huttwil. Then it was further retrenched to Sumiswald.

    And, the line to Wasen i.E. was shut 10 or 15 years ago, but the rails are still shiny. Lots of small industry in the valley between Suniswald and Wasen uses freight service.

    Lines that still exist show signs of support. New higher station platforms; new light rail cars/trains.

    The new strategic mission of the Swiss Rail Network is fast, frequent interurban service between major citeis.

    That is happening.

    Slowpoke

    Slowpoke
    Participant
    7567 posts
    10 August 2018 at 22:33:55 #893640

    Hej Peterli-

    I sent you an e-mail on August 7th. Did you get it?

    Slowpoke

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