The Daily Mail reports the city is testing a new anti-urine repellent paint that ‘bounces back’ the urine of anyone who relieves himself over it.

City workers have painted nine walls in badly-affected areas of the city with a special ultra-violet coated, ‘super-hydrophobic’ paint that repels almost any liquid.

(Readers may remember this similar initiative being undertaken in Hamburg)

If an offender tries to urinate on a coated wall, instead of running down the wall, the urine will spray back and probably hit his trousers and shoes. Signs on the walls in English, Spanish and Chinese advise anyone caught short to ‘Hold it!…Seek relief in an appropriate place’, but some people “might learn the hard way”, said the city’s director of public works Mohammed Nuru.

Officials said it was far cheaper to paint the wall with the sealant than to send out staff to clean it. Made in Florida, the Ultra-Ever Dry paint uses special technology to create a surface with tiny patterns of geometric shapes that have ‘peaks’. It is these high points that repel liquid.