Yes, hire cleaners to staff the restrooms and charge a small amount to use them. Its not rocket science, it works (see European train stations), and it puts people to work. Its a shame we don't have more of that here in the USA.

Ugh. As an European, I really dislike this new move to charge for bathroom use. It's often expensive, it requires having change (yay, trip to the ATM!) and it means having to wait if the staffer is him/herself in the loo.

I would not call it a "new" move. It is an old idea that works. I would rather come up with a coin or two than use a toilet stall sprayed with diarrhea on the floor and walls (and sometimes ceiling :-) ).

It's new around here; until a couple of years ago, I don't remember any paid toilets.

And there are other choices besides "diarrhea floors" and coin payment; in train stations, for example, they could simply charge a fee to the train company to pay for the permanent staff, which could then (very slightly) increase the price of tickets to accommodate it.

If it works it only works by making most of the people avoid them :). I don't expect much from a free toilet but I usually don't have spare coins with me to use (especially abroad) so I end up going to various establishments like McDonald's hoping they don't lock down the toilets. Even if they do, I can buy a cheeseburger for the same price, which buys me both a clean paid toilet and something to eat.

Because within half an hour of being cleaned those toilets will be unusable again.

a) Do you really have flying bathroom defacement squads? Most of the places I've seen, even once a day would be fine.

b) In the few locations with particularly bad problems, isn't that really telling us that e.g. the problem is not something which can be solved by technology as opposed to, say, funding mental health programs?

Then you should hire people to clean every half an hour.