Some people are fouling a stretch of Brighton beach because of a lack of public toilets, councillors were told this week.
Concerned resident Mike Goodrich said that the only public toilets along the Kemp Town seafront were at Peter Pan’s children’s playground – and he said: “They’re not really set up for adult use.”
Mr Goodrich urged Brighton and Hove City Council to consider putting in some toilets between the Palace Pier and the Volk’s Electric Railway station by Brighton Marina.
He said: “That promenade is used a lot and leads to fouling around the place.”
Mr Goodrich raised the issue at a meeting of the full council at Hove Town Hall on Thursday (26 March). He said that the mile-long stretch of seafront had a heavy footfall, especially in the summer.
He asked whether “the council had any plans to build new toilets anywhere along that stretch”?
Labour councillor Tim Rowkins, the council’s cabinet member for net zero and environmental services, said that there were currently no plans to open public toilets along this stretch.
But he said that it could be possible in the future, adding that he recognised that the toilets at Peter Pan’s were “not really suitable for general adult use as you say”.
He said: “We love toilets in this administration. We have 13 reopened, nine refurbished, plus major accessibility improvements.”
He said that fellow councillors Jacob Taylor and Julie Cattell were working on an ambitious plan for the Madeira Terraces, adding: “Our view is that an additional toilet somewhere along that stretch would be a very welcome thing to include.”
He said that the toilets at Black Rock had recently been refurbished as part of a £366,000 project involving the council and Southern Water.
When asked when new toilets might open, Councillor Rowkins said: “While there isn’t a specific timeframe … we would love to put one in there.”
Councillor Rowkins also said that the first phase of a plan to restore the Madeira Terraces, begun in November 2024, was more focused on “getting a stretch restored, signalling to the wider world that that’s the direction of travel”.
He offered to return to this topic as the plan for a second phase of restoration progressed.
The whole of Brighton is a toilet.