This popular tourist spot installed timers on its toilets: ‘It felt like I was being monitored’

A popular tourist destination in China has installed timers on their toilets.

The restrooms at China’s Yungang Buddhist Grottoes in the city of Datong, Shanxi Province, have been updated with timers above each stall.

A screen above each potty either displays the word “empty” when the stall is unoccupied or the amount of time the door has been locked.

Several Chinese news and social media sites have published a video of the new setup at the UNESCO-listed World Heritage site as people questioned the unique design.

A staff member told Nanchang Evening News, a state-run newspaper, that the toilet timers were installed to help manage the increase in visitors coming to see the Buddhist cave art and ensure their safety, “in case some guests use the toilet for an extended period and an emergency occurs,” according to CNN.

“They aren’t there to control the durations you could use the bathrooms,” the staff member told Xiaoxiang Morning Herald, a state-run local newspaper.

“It’s impossible that we would kick someone out [of the bathroom stall] midway. And we aren’t setting a time limit such as five or 10 minutes of how long one could use the toilets.”

But despite staffers’ insistence, visitors were still uneasy about being timed while on the toilet.

“I found it quite advanced technologically so you don’t have to queue outside or knock on a bathroom door,” the paper quoted the visitor as saying.

“But I also found it a little bit embarrassing. It felt like I was being monitored.”

The 252 caves and 51,000 statues of the Yungang Buddhist Grottoes are some of the biggest attractions in northern China’s Shanxi province.

They continue to welcome more guests every year — a record high of 3 million in 2023.