Nudging Solution

Kate Fox
Sep 13, 2020
2 min read

Field of Interest

As I have worked for a healthcare company, I am interested in helping others' health and wellbeing. I have an understanding that those who are less fortunate and not financially set are more likely to be faced with an unhealthy lifestyle. This has opened my eyes to notice these flaws in our society. I would like to create a solution that can help others less fortunate within Denver.

The problem

Lately, COVID-19 has become a huge issue throughout the world. Living in downtown Denver, I have noticed the increasing number of homeless within the community. It has come to my attention that due to restaurants being shut down, public restrooms and portapotties that once were found around the downtown area have been taken away to avoid the spread of COVID-19. Everyone needs to use the restroom but if there is no clean and proper way for the homeless to take care of their business, where else are they going to go other than on the sides of buildings and sidewalks. I would like to figure out a solution to provide the homeless with a safe and sanitary way for them to use the restroom. Therefore, in the long run, we can avoid finding fecal matter being everywhere. Once COVID-19 has subsided and everyone is ready to come out downtown, this problem could become a huge issue. If this public concern is not solved in some way, then downtown Denver could be given a bad reputation and feel unsafe for everyone.

Behavioral Mapping

A problem I want to observe for this exercise is homeless around downtown and the actions they take to decide where to use the restroom. The target behaviors that I was searching for in this environment were if there were corners or sides of the building that had fecal matter and pee due to the homeless not having somewhere to go. I noticed that there were no portapotties for the public to use and all public restrooms were closed. Even the public restrooms on 16th and Arapahoe were closed due to COVID-19.