Business owners and residents alike in Beijing are crying foul over a plan to demolish thousands of public toilets -- in favor of restaurants, shops and hotels offering their facilities for free.

Last week, the city announced a plan to demolish four out of every 10 public toilets in the city as part of massive redevelopment work underway for the 2008 Olympic Games, which Beijing will host.

By then, the number of public loos in the city will have plummeted from 7,700 at present to about 3,000, city officials said, to cater for a densely populated city of about 13 million people excluding tourists and migrants.

The city appealed to numerous commercial buildings to make their toilets generally available, the aim being to enable people to have facilities within an eight-minute walk in busy districts.

"Providing public toilets should not just be the responsibility of the government. Businesses should help," said Guo Weidong, director of the Beijing City propaganda and education division.

But business owners are flushed with anger over the plan.

"This is wrong. Restaurants are for customers who pay. It will hurt our profits," said Yuan Xu, owner of the medium-scale Yugoslavia Restaurant.

"Who's going to pay for the extra water and electricity we have to use to clean the toilets?"

Li Rongru, a saleswoman at a meat-pancake shop, said: "We have employees and customers who need to use our toilet. Why can't government office buildings open their toilets for the public to use? They have plenty of toilets on every floor."

China's capital city has far more public loos than most major metropolises. In fact, public toilets have been something of a way of life in Beijing for decades.

Traditional courtyard homes in the city lacked bathrooms. So since the 1960s, the city has built at least one, sometimes as many as three, public toilets on almost every residential block.

"It's not appropriate to see toilets everywhere in Beijing," said Guo. "We should learn from other countries where restaurants like McDonald's have no problems letting people use their toilet even without making a purchase."

He said the city had no plans to replace the demolished toilets, but would ensure those remaining were clean and modern.

Residents, however, see the problem from a different perspective.

"Beijing has too many people. It's impossible to copy overseas cities," said Guo Haiyan, a taxi driver who says he takes an average of about 10 bathroom breaks each day.

"If they knock down the toilets, then it's going to be the side of the road for me."

The issue has inevitably become viewed by some as a reflection of the growing divide between China's rich and poor in an increasingly class-conscious society.

"It's fine to tell people to go into hotels and restaurants to use the toilet, but who's going to let people like us in?" bemoaned another cab driver in sweaty shirt and rolled up trousers.

"It's hard enough to find a toilet as it is," cabbie Wu Jinchun agreed.

(Xinhua News Agency July 28, 2004)