Nearly a quarter of citizens in Seoul prefer traditional toilets to western style ones in public restrooms, a government survey showed Tuesday.
According to the survey conducted by the Seoul Metropolitan Government on 3,137 people in March 2015, 22.8 percent of the respondents said they prefer traditional latrines where there is no need for the user to make direct contact with the toilet bowl.
A total of 86.7 percent of people who said they preferred traditional toilets cited sanitary reasons, among other factors.
Among the respondents, 8.8 percent said they do not mind either one, and the rest preferred western style toilet seat arrangements, according to the city government.
The municipal government said it will reflect the poll results when building new public restrooms in subway stations by preparing both traditional and western toilets in a set ratio. It will also take into account that women are more favorably inclined towards traditional style latrines than men.
For new subway stations under construction, the city will make bathrooms with both western and traditional toilets in the ratio of 2 to 18 for men and 63 to 37 for women, the city government said.
Currently, the number of traditional and western-style toilets differ in each restroom in the city's subway stations, as there are no set guidelines.
"There have been complaints from people, as the ratio of traditional toilets was generally too low," a city official said, asking not to be named. "We will apply the new ratio for the subway stations that will be built in the future." (Yonhap)
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