THE statistics indicating that out of 67 visitors to York Art Gallery 60 visitors had merely “gone to use the restroom” (Letters, March 13 and 15) are significant.

Basic, really: nobody needs art, but everybody needs a loo.

Moreover, in shunning York’s public toilets, those 60 flying visitors demonstrated a sensibility and discernment which any art-lover must applaud.

George Bernard Shaw, as a St Pancras councillor, fought nobly to introduce public toilets for women.

The cause was so unequivocally just and the victory so resounding, that the provision of public toilets eventually became a standard by which to judge the progress of civilisation.

The question is: have our public toilets, after more than a century, had their inglorious day?

They are usually smelly, rarely pristine and always architecturally incongruous (witness the absurd, unlamented, Splash Palace).

Given the choice and the pressing need, would we not all opt for a discreet and decent publicly accessible toilet, as did those 60?

Would it not be most fitting and in every way more desirable if all publicly accessible buildings were to provide publicly-accessible toilets?

William Dixon Smith, Welland Rise, Acomb, York