Parade and Procession Toilets in San Diego

How many portable toilets does a parade need?

For events on City of San Diego property the guideline is one chemical or portable toilet per 250 people at estimated peak attendance, 10 percent accessible, unless existing public facilities are enough. A parade should apply that to each zone it uses, then add staging units for participants who gather before the start.

Spectator counts for parades are loose. A route that reports a quarter of a million watchers over a day never holds all of them at once, but the busiest block can be very full. The guideline asks for the estimated peak, so make a conservative guess for each zone and let the provider help you check it.

Coronado is a separate city with its own government, so its parade follows its own permit rules, not the City of San Diego Office of Special Events. Check with the town.

What is different about a staging area?

Staging areas hold marchers, bands, floats and volunteers for an hour or more before the start. They need their own toilets because participants cannot leave their positions to use spectator cabins. Place a small bank close to the assembly point with a clear, short walk and a handwash stand.

Staging also brings vehicles. Floats, buses and equipment trucks fill the same streets cabins want to stand on, so decide who moves where before the provider delivers.

Because staging may begin early, ask the provider about early-morning delivery and what the street closure allows.

How should units be laid out at the finish?

Put them where the crowd settles, on level ground off the main path, with accessible cabins at the front of each bank and handwash close to food. A park finish like Balboa Park's Marston Point needs a plan for hours of use, not minutes, so servicing and queue space matter more than at the route.

At Pride, the parade ends and a two-day ticketed festival continues in Balboa Park. A Friday night block party and rally in Hillcrest comes first. That means the same neighborhood needs units on three separate occasions in a single week, with different layouts each time.

In Coronado, the parade ends and the crowd flows to Spreckels Park for concerts. A bank near the park saves everyone a walk back to Orange Avenue.

What do parade participants and volunteers need?

Marshals, volunteers, bands and drivers may spend several hours on the route and cannot leave their posts to find a restroom. Provide cabins at staging, a few along the route in places reserved for staff, and a clear way for them to be reached on foot. Tell the provider how many people fall in this group.

Participants are easy to forget because they are not counted as spectators. In a parade of a few hundred marchers, that is a few hundred extra trips in the hour before the start. If a large marching band assembles in a lot beside the route, the lot needs its own small bank.

A good plan also sets aside a cabin or two near the reviewing area or the stage for speakers and performers. These do not need to be special units, only reserved for the day and marked. A volunteer who knows the layout can steer people to the right bank and keep the route lines short.

What time should units be on site, and how early should a committee book?

Units should arrive before the first barricade goes up, early enough for the provider to set and check them. Book as soon as the date and route are approved. The provider confirms a slot only when it has trucks free, and the line promises no time, so ask for it in writing.

Pride's parade steps off at 10 a.m. on a Saturday, and Coronado's Fourth of July parade started at 10 a.m. in the most recent edition on record. Those are the visible times. The working times begin much earlier, when streets are cleared, floats are placed and the first volunteers arrive.

Plan delivery backwards from the earliest participant arrival, not from the parade start. If the provider arrives after staging has begun, there will be vehicles in the way and a queue for toilets that are not there yet.

Committees that organize a parade every year can reuse last year's map, but they should still update the headcount and ask the provider whether the route or the street conditions have changed.