Case Study: Long Beach supports placemaking with Throne partnership

Written by: Beth D’Arcy

About Long Beach

Home to 466,000 residents, Long Beach sits along the Southern California coast within the LA metropolitan area. Visitors and locals enjoy its beautiful beaches, diverse neighborhoods, and year-round outdoor activities. The City is celebrated for using technology to solve tough challenges and enhance services for its residents.

Long Beach’s public restroom challenge

Long Beach is one of the most popular destinations for outdoor recreation in the LA area. Visitors and residents enjoy boating out of the Shoreline Marina, spending a day at the Belmont Pier beach, strolling the Harvey Milk Promenade, and playing pickleball at Deforest Park.

But despite their popularity, these locations lacked a crucial element: public restrooms. Visitors to Belmont Pier and Shoreline Marina faced a 5 to 10 minute walk to the nearest restroom. The public restrooms at Deforest Park closed due to structural damage, and local businesses along the Harvey Milk Promenade felt the burden of providing restroom access to non-customers.

Without adequate public restrooms, tourists, families, and residents couldn’t fully enjoy these destinations.  

To address the issue, the City tried placing porta-potties in several locations, but users complained and staff struggled to maintain them. Permanent restroom facilities would provide a long-term solution, but couldn’t address the immediate need. Neither option solved the issue of people camping and overstaying in existing public restrooms, which prevented others from accessing the facilities.

The City needed a solution that addressed the unique challenges of each location – and fast. They couldn’t let restroom access keep people from experiencing the best of Long Beach.

The decision to try Throne

The City first heard about Throne at a Smart Cities Conference in May 2023, before Throne was servicing LA County.   After Throne launched in the LA area with LA Metro and showed broad community acceptance,  the City of Long Beach’s Technology and Innovation Department brought the concept to other city departments.

But before moving forward, they also explored a few alternatives: portable sanitation trailers, pre-fabricated permanent restrooms, and smart sewer-connected restrooms.

The City needed a solution that solved the immediate problem of providing safe, clean restrooms while also collecting data the City could use for future infrastructure decisions.

• Portable sanitation trailers aren’t equipped with smart technology, which limits the City’s ability to collect usage data, monitor the unit for overstays and cleanliness, and collect user feedback.
• Prefabricated permanent restrooms also aren’t tech-enabled, can’t be relocated, and don’t prevent the safety issues the City already experiences with existing permanent restrooms.
• Smart sewer-connected restrooms collect some data, but require significant upfront capital investment and a semi-permanent sewer connection the City wasn’t ready to commit to.

Unlike the alternatives, Throne checked every box – and then some:

• Requires no upfront capital investment
• Deploys within hours and can be relocated with the seasons
• Provides running water, toilet, and sink without a sewer connection
• Locks and unlocks remotely to prevent overstays
• Remotely monitors each unit for cleanliness, usage, and misuse with 21+ sensors
• Local workforce cleans each unit every 12 uses, on average
• Collects valuable performance data to inform future decision-making

Working with Throne

The City of Long Beach and Throne launched a four-month pilot to test if smart restrooms could solve their public restroom access problem. The City signed the contract on March 4, and by April 15 the first Throne was up and running.

Based on input from Parks and DPW, the City chose four high-demand locations to pilot Thrones:

Deforest Park, a popular pickleball court location without a working restroom.

Harvey Milk Promenade, a downtown location where businesses feel the burden of providing ‘public’ restrooms.

Shoreline Marina, the number one requested location for a public restroom in the community survey.

Belmont Pier, a high-traffic destination beloved by local runners and tourists alike.  

With Throne’s help, the City designed the pilot to collect performance data from each Throne that would show whether demand justified a long-term investment. Thanks to real-time data from 21+ sensors, user feedback, and 24/7 monitoring of each Throne, the City could analyze:

• Usage patterns
• User satisfaction ratings
• Cleanliness levels
• Uptime percentage
• Maintenance responsiveness

Long Beach’s return on investment

The City set aside $99,200 for the pilot program from the Technology and Innovation Department’s Innovation Fund and the Parks, Recreation and Marine Department operation and maintenance budget.

With no upfront capital investment and a monthly service-based contract, the City launched the program immediately.

Throne pilot program results

Because Throne handles development, monitoring, cleaning, and maintenance, the City could focus on analyzing how the smart restrooms affected placemaking in the area – especially its impact on cleanliness and vandalism rates.

In just four months, the City of Long Beach collected enough data to call the pilot a success and justify extending the program to September 2026:

• 0.02% of users had access restricted due to repeated misuse
• 2.3 minutes: average duration of use
• 0 calls to EMS or law enforcement
• 30% of users returned for more than one visit
• 231 uses: highest usage at a single Throne in one day
• 91% uptime of all Thrones

User feedback

• 4/5 stars: average cleanliness rating
• 92% say Throne is "Good" or "Great"
• 100% of users leave within 15 minutes

Text reviews

“I love throne. Makes me want to visit the Promenade more.” —Harvey Milk Promenade Throne user

“This is a great idea and I really hope we can keep this kind of bathroom around the beach.” —Shoreline Marina Throne user

“Having a clean restroom for me and my kids as we come to spend time at the park brings me peace of mind. Thank you.” —Deforest Park Throne user

“It’s a great use for cyclists. I liked that I can fit my bike inside… so it makes my experience safer when using public restrooms.” —Belmont Pier Throne user

Enhancing city amenities with Throne

The City of Long Beach knew that to create a truly welcoming public space, visitors must have access to clean, safe, and convenient public restrooms. Now families, residents, and tourists can spend more time enjoying Long Beach without having to cut it short searching for a restroom.    

Our partnership with Long Beach shows how cities can use technology to quickly tackle complex infrastructure challenges.

In fact, Long Beach was named Top Digital City for its population size in the Center for Digital Government’s 2025 Digital Cities Survey. The award recognized the City’s use of technology to improve city services – including the smart restroom pilot with Throne.

Is Throne right for your city?

Throne Labs is revolutionizing public restroom access across the U.S. Whether you’re looking to pilot smart restrooms in a few high-demand locations or expand access citywide, we’ll help you design a program that meets your needs and budget. Let’s talk!