On Friday the Herald Sun carried a story titled 'Flush fight: a sexist history of Melbourne's public toilets', rehearsing the chronology of social and technological change that saw Melbourne's first public urinal for men opened in 1859, and the first underground public toilet for women in 1902. Toilets have been a popular news item over. The underground public toilet in Russell Street was built in 1902 and designed by the Melbourne City Surveyor Adrien C Mountain.
It included facilities for men and women, and was both the first underground public toilet built in Melbourne, and the first public toilet for women. It was one of a number of underground public toilets built in Melbourne in the early twentieth century in response to. The gateway sign advices that the loo is ready for use (after removal of the concrete slab) `The underground men's public toilet in West Melbourne, built in 1938, is one of eleven built in Melbourne in the early twentieth century in response to public demand for public toilet facilities in Melbourne that were both sanitary and discreet.
Street. The first public toilet in Melbourne, a urinal for men only, had been built in 1859, but these street level toilets were regarded as indecently public, and without an underground sewerage system, the waste discharged into the gutters. Underground toilets were removed from public view and so better satisfied contemporary perceptions of decency.
The collection includes Melbourne's first underground toilet, Melbourne's first public toilet for women, Melbourne's oldest extant public toilet, and Australia's oldest known underground toilet. The underground public toilet in Elizabeth Street near Victoria Street has historical significance as one of the first underground public toilets in Melbourne. It was the second underground public toilet for women and the third for men in Victoria.
It has significance for its association with issues of gender equality and the activities of the first-wave feminists in Victoria, as a reflection. This toilet is one of at least four further underground conveniences provided by the Melbourne City Council in the 1930s. Interestingly, these were all outside the CBD; the other three extant toilets being at Faraday & Lygon Streets corner, Carlton, Carpentaria Place, East Melbourne, King Street & Erroll Street corner, North Melbourne.
