Learning Lavatories

Lavatory, not to be confused with laboratory, is a professional term used for bathrooms also known as restrooms. Although, I think the nuns used lavatory when I was in grade school. Nuns were most often always very proper while in school. The Madison Public Market (MPM), which has been in the works for a long time, is finally set to open this summer, perhaps sometime in July. The MPM is located in a former city of Madison public works garage, and is located at the intersections of First and Johnson Streets. The facility has two levels, each contain restrooms, oops, lavatories. The restroom art work was sponsored by the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District. The lavatories are unique, and provoke thought and provide information. And, perhaps spur persons to be more conscious of what they do. If you have to do #2, some of the restroom walls will provide sufficient reading material.

Pac-man, good bacteria eating the bad

The restrooms are each an individual space. Each room contains a toilet and a sink. But, the most unique aspect is that they are completed with a unique design to instill certain values of conservation, how the sanitary sewer system and treatment plant generally function, and quite frankly, to learn that only certain things go down the drain, hence the learning part of the name. Yet, some are also fun, such as a Pac-man feature of microbes that eats bad bugs. When they were information the commission about this, I wondered if kids today even know what Pac-man is, or looks like. Pac-man dates from the earliest computer games.

The fist floor series of restrooms are titled "Where Will You Go?" and takes market patrons though the waste collection, treatment and return processes of the MMSD system. The second level focus for the restrooms is on the user. Titled "Can" it focuses on what the user can do regarding the use of water and to enable to the collection and treatment systems to function more optimally. Each restroom has a different design motif. These motifs include "disposing of wipes in the trash, putting grease in the garbage, keeping leaves out of the lakes and gutters, and taking paint and household chemicals to Clean Sweep, to protect the wastewater system and our local watershed." (MMSD website)

Each floor has seven individual restrooms. The "Where Will You Go" has the following theme, each for one restroom: Bubble Party, where aeration tanks keep the microbes working; Biodigester Quest which illustrates how tiny bacteria, using Pac-Man, in digesters create nutrient rich fertilizer; Bright Future, UV disinfection (MMSD was one of the pioneers of this system); Incredible Journey--after treatment the wastewater is released back to nature. In the case of MMSD to Badfish Creek and then to the Rock River and Mississippi River. Fun fact: the journey from MMSD to the Gulf of Mexico takes about 40 days. Next comes A Conduit Attitude--the varied sizes of pipes that carry wastewater to the treatment plant. Wild Ride--the length of MMSD owned pipes would stretch from the Madison Public Market to Milwaukee and back. Finally, So Much Water, MMSD treats, on average, 40 million gallons of waste water a day. That is enough wastewater to fill 60 Olympic sized swimming pools. 

The thing is, the average daily volume has been about 40 mg/day for decades. I recall it being about that number when I joined the MMSD commission in 1992. This, even though the population of the service area has grown significantly in the past three decades. This shows how low flow devices have helped save water. Small achievements make a difference. The district recognizes that this current level will, perhaps in the not to distant future, give way to higher average daily flows. Personal responsibility can play a large part. 

This takes us to the second level bathrooms, where the flow of the theme continues, but with an emphasis on personal responsibility. On the second level the patron sees "Welcome to the Can." The seven individual restrooms take the initiative of "You can..... 1. You can rake leaves to save the lakes. My wife and I regularly pick up the leaves in front of our house, as the street sweeper does not come down as often as it perhaps should. 2. You can keep it fresh by limiting use of salt and making sure you water softener properly works. I last placed salt in our softener on June 5, 2025, 120 pounds worth and should likely make that date again. 3. You can use your voice, advocate for waterways, not unlike what I am doing with this blog post. 4. You can reduce water use--we have rain barrels, low flow devices, and we save water from the tap as we wait for warm water; these all have helped reduce our water use. 5. You ca dispose properly--unused medications and other items, to drop off sites, or what is able to clean sweep.  6. You can be a champion flusher--only flush poop, pee, puke and toilet paper. Items called flushable wipes are not. 7. One final restroom is for those thinking of careers, and encourages them to think of a job is water resources. 

A Can do attitude helps the lakes

The MPM is a wise user of water. Although, with individual bathrooms, there are no urinals, the market does have storage tanks that gather roof water and use that for toilets. The below photo shows the storm drain which leads to the storage tanks (blue pipes), the dark purple piping is the non-potable water, ie stored storm water, that goes to the toilets. The white piping is domestic cold water, or potable water.

Pipe system at MPM

Personal responsibility can make a difference. Each small act helps. In his recent encyclical Magnificat Humanitas, Pope Leo XIV quotes Gandalf in Lord of the Rings saying this: "The twentieth-century Catholic author J.R.R. Tolkien, in the words of a protagonist in one of his novels, described our responsibility in this way: 'It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till.'” Pope Francis added to this "The civilization of love will not arise from a single or spectacular gesture, but from the sum total of small and steadfast acts of fidelity that serve as a bulwark against dehumanization." (see paragraph 213).  The learning lavatories at the MPM are intended to help bring about a large number of small success stories. We all have contributions we can make in the never ending achievement for clean water. Clean water is important for a clean earth to till. 

Images by author at Madison Public Market, 14 May 2026