Atlanta Deploys Urine Detectors To Curb Scourge Of Peed-In Elevators

Are people holding it in because of the actual pee alarm, or just because there is a sign about a pee alarm? (WSB-TV)

Who knew that the elevators in Atlanta’s MARTA rail stations had become a haven for those in need of a semi-private place to relieve their aching bladders? Obviously the people who have complained enough about the problem to convince the Rapid Transit Authority to deploy a urine-detection system.

WSB-TV reports that the program — supposedly the first of its kind — is currently being tested in a single elevator in a Midtown Atlanta train station. It apparently uses sensors to detect when someone has decided to go #1 somewhere between floors 2 and 3.

“If somebody was to urinate in here, there’s going to be a splash factor. It would splash and it would sense,” explains MARTA’s director of elevators and escalators, which sounds like a fun job until you go back and re-read what he just described and realize that this is what he has to deal with all day.

The urine detection device (or UDD) somehow detects that micturating is occurring and it sounds an alarm intended to bring the MARTA police and deal with the baddie with the bad bladder.

In the month since the one test UDD was put into place (along with a sign warning people about the UDD’s existence), MARTA says there has only been one incident and that elevator violator was arrested. Before the UDD, MARTA says this particular elevator was being urinated in on a daily basis.

Based on that success, MARTA will begin rolling out UDDs to other elevators in the coming months at a cost of $10,000 a pop.

We wonder if it’s the UDD’s sensors that are keeping potential urinators from doing their business or if MARTA could save a lot of cash and just install signs saying there is a UDD in the elevator, much like the people who put up alarm company window stickers without actually having a home security system, or the pools with empty warnings about a chemical in the water that will create a cloud of colored water around someone who couldn’t be bothered to hit the restroom.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist