Frequent restroom closures irritate LIRR commuters

Long Island commuters on the go have had a harder time than usual finding somewhere to "go," as stepped-up maintenance efforts at the LIRR have resulted in train and station restrooms more frequently being out of service, riders and railroad officials said.

One recent Tuesday afternoon, Evandro Cavadinha’s girlfriend headed to the women’s restroom at the Long Island Rail Road’s Penn Station concourse only to find it gated off. It was the third time in a week that a bathroom was closed when they needed to use one, Cavandinha said.

A gathering of women erupted in applause minutes later when the gates were pulled back, and Cavandinha’s girlfriend rushed inside.

“It’s not good, because when we are exploring the city, it’s important to have a restroom available,” said Cavandinha, 45, who was visiting New York from Sao Paolo, Brazil. “Unfortunately, we experienced this bad situation here.”

The experience is shared by other LIRR customers who say they’ve noticed an uptick in restroom closures. The railroad’s president confirmed that heightened cleaning and maintenance of bathrooms has necessitated more frequent closures, but believes customers are appreciating the results.

“All it takes is one person to go in the bathroom and make a mess or, you know, leave something that's undesirable in there. That gives a lasting impression to people. So we make sure that we go in there and we clean it regularly,” LIRR president Rob Free said in an interview. “I think it’s being well-received by our customers.”

Free, who began his career as an LIRR station cleaner, has made bathroom cleanliness a key priority since becoming LIRR president in April 2024. Among his earliest initiatives on the job was to invite riders to share feedback on restroom conditions by scanning QR codes in station and train lavatories.

Free said since launching that program, customer satisfaction with bathroom cleanliness has improved by 10% in rider surveys. He acknowledged there can be a tradeoff in having to close bathrooms for cleaning.

“I think we're doing it a little more frequently and maybe a little bit longer to give it a little more thorough cleaning to give it a boost,” Free said of the Penn closures.

Mixed reviews

Stepping out of the men’s room at Penn Station, Valley Stream commuter Nathan Cohen said, “considering the shape and the environment of everything else at Penn,” he’d give the facilities a passing grade.

“It’s not a bathroom I’d choose to go to if I had other options, but I think it’s maintained as well as it could be,” Cohen, 49, said.

Still, some riders riders say they haven’t noticed a difference.

“It’s always just gross,” Leah Chiappino, 25, of Smithtown, said while waiting for a train near the lone set of restrooms along the railroad’s Penn concourse, adjacent to its customer waiting room. “They’re just really dirty. ... It definitely needs to be improved.”

Asked about riders’ concerns about sharing bathrooms with people with particularly poor hygiene, Free noted the facilities are open to the public. He urged riders to report any illegal activity to Metropolitan Transportation Authority Police, including to officers stationed just outside Penn’s bathrooms. LIRR rules prohibit people from bathing or washing clothes in station bathroom sinks.

On-board restrooms

The lack of available restrooms for LIRR riders isn’t limited to stations. Some riders have also complained recently about on-board restrooms being locked, even when unoccupied. Free acknowledged train crews sometimes keep train restrooms closed if there is an issue with one, “rather than giving that negative perception” that comes with a stopped up sink or overflowing toilet.

“Even if we unfortunately have to lock one bathroom out, there's plenty of other bathrooms on a train,” Free said.

Bethpage commuter Susan Marten said she’s recently encountered locked bathrooms on trains, some occupied by fare evaders hiding from ticket collectors. She, too, has been told by conductors to try a different car — forcing her to go “hunting for the next available bathroom on a moving train,” she said.

“The apathy from the conductor that day blew my mind. I mean, where are these guys going to the bathroom? Don’t they need to use it too?” Marten said. “All I know is that we pay a fortune to use Long Island Rail Road, and having working, clean facilities is a must.”

Modest expectations

LIRR customer satisfaction was at a two-year low in the railroad’s most recent customer survey, taken in the spring. And about 18% of respondents said “cleaner restrooms on board” would increase their overall satisfaction with the LIRR.

Gerard Bringmann, chairman of the LIRR Commuter Council, said, but for the occasional complaint about fare-evading stowaways, bathroom-related grievances are not too common among seasoned commuters. While LIRR regulars do have some legitimate bathroom gripes, including about the scarcity of facilities at Jamaica Station and insufficient hours at some Nassau and Suffolk stations, Bringmann said the most seasoned commuters have modest expectations of LIRR bathrooms and view them only as a last resort.

“The regular riders know where the bathrooms are, they know how limited it is, so your average commuter usually uses the bathroom before he leaves his office,” he said.

Bringmann also commended the railroad for stepping up maintenance of bathrooms, even if it means taking them out of service more frequently. He acknowledged the particular challenges of keeping on-board restrooms clean, given the difficulty of maintaining your balance while doing your business on a moving train.

“You’d have to be Olga Korbut,” Bringmann said.