Handicapped toilet

Handicapped stalls are impractical. They are much larger than normal toilet stalls because the wheelchair must fit alongside the toilet. The handicapped individual must then muscle him/herself laterally out of the chair then back onto the toilet; alternatively she moves forwards out of the chair, does a 180 turn using bars mounted on the wall, then reverses it to get back to the chair. It is like an Olympic gymnastic event.

The problem is that these stalls use conventional toilets. What is needed is a toilet bowl set far forward from the wall/tank, designed to receive a person sitting "backwards" while accomodating legs which may not be very flexible. The wheelchair is pulled up directly in front of the bowl, and the person then moves directly forward to sit on the bowl. By having it set forward it would not be necessary to widely spread legs to avoid wall/tank. When through, the person then moves directly backwards into the chair. There should be bars to the left _and_ right of the toilet to facilitate this. This would also be more conservative of bathroom space, as the wheelchair stall would only need to be slightly larger than a regular stall.