Gotta go! Ottawa

It's a calm day in Confederation Park when a lack of public toilets leads to chaos. People (and animals) everywhere need to find somewhere to go outside. Some are better than hiding it than others. A long lineup of people from behind a singular, toilet paperless porta potty. This is our future without safe, clean, and accessible public toilets!!

Organization:
Gotta Go Campaign
Goal:
Raise awareness about the lack of public toilets in Ottawa and the need for more accessible, clean and safe public bathrooms.

Initial Concept and Design
We’ve all been there. You’re out in public and there’s nowhere to go to the bathroom. Desperate times call for desperate measures and everywhere starts looking like a feasible spot to pop a squat. This is what popped into my mind when I came across the contest and the ideas started flowing.

I selected one of my favourite parks in the city that would be iconic for Ottawa residents to recognize. From there, I began planning all the places someone might comically go if the situation got desperate and situations we associate with going to public bathrooms, like long lines and no toilet paper. I hoped to achieve a level of comedy with a couple of the scenes and prompt people to think about what the city might be like (kind of gross) if we don’t invest in more public toilet infrastructure.

Process
I did some initial sketches in a notebook and jogged through Confederation Park on my morning run to get some ideas of elements to bring in. I shared the idea for the contest with my mom, who suggested I should incorporate someone who’s pregnant in the design. This was an important suggestion and it prompted me to think about the implications a lack of washrooms, let alone accessible and gender-neutral washrooms, has on different people.

I created the illustration on my iPad using the free drawing app SketchBook. I find this app is easy to use and offers some of the same functionality I’m familiar with using on Photoshop. However, there are several limitations including the number of layers available, being able to create layer masks, and brush options. This experience has encouraged me to download Procreate for the iPad for more advanced functionality and improve my illustration skills.

Having completed the project, I am proud of the poster and excited to hear about the outcome of the contest. I think this could be the beginning of a seasonal series and with some collaboration from the company, I could reimagine a variety of scenarios across the city.