Where’s the tap? Why public bathrooms give me a sinking feeling

June 22, 2026 — 5:30pm

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.

Remove items from your saved list to add more.

I used an electric hand dryer for the first time in the mid-’70s. It was newly installed in the Ladies’ Lounge of Foards department store, in my home town of Sale in Victoria. For a young kid in a regional town it felt super posh.

Innovation felt endless as a kid, like my first digital alarm clock that woke me to the smooth sound of the radio rather than the hammering peal of a bell. Then there was the knife that sharpened each time it was removed from its scabbard and effortlessly sliced through a tomato.

Decades on and that wide-eyed kid who loved rubbing her hands under the warm air is now a cynical grown-up. Innovation has been hijacked by an incessant need to fix what isn’t broken, as evident on a recent visit to the newly refurbished toilets at Melbourne Airport.

Whereas an individual hand basin once provided the demarcation of where to stand to wash hands, now individual mirrors are the only clue as the sink is communal. One long trough. Great if I’m looking for somewhere to tie my horse while I mosey into the nearby........

© WA Today