Twyla Nunes-Ueno Capstone 2025

Philadelphia has a problem. Actually, Philadelphia has many problems. But an underappreciated one has to do with toilets. Philadelphia only has 1 public toilet, the pilot in a newfangled program called Philly Phlush. Until 2023, our beautiful city had zero public restrooms. This means that when you need to wizz in the city of brotherly love, you need to hope that a business owner takes some brotherly pity on you and lets you use their loo. For some of us this is easy, but the situation becomes more complex for those with specific needs. Mothers with strollers, babies who need their diapers changed, and people in wheelchairs all face more problems finding accessible bathrooms. And we wonder why the broad street line smells like pee! I can’t build a bathroom. I’m just one teenager! But this is an important issue to me and I can work to connect Philadelphians to businesses that have opened their plumbing to those in need. I’m building a website that tracks bathrooms by accessibility metrics like ADA compliance. It allows me to meander around the city, searching for toilets on pretty days, and stay inside coding new features on rainy ones. I collaborated with Daphne to research and brainstorm this capstone, and we are merging our two projects - a website and an op-ed - to form one capstone. We researched the restroom needs of Philadelphians, and the laws surrounding public bathrooms together, and her op-ed is displayed along with my interactive map tool in a website that I’ve designed. View my capstone at where2wizz.vercel.app