Why aren't restaurant sinks a bit taller?

Factual Questions
1

This just now occurred to me, and I can’t think how to Google it, so I’m hoping y’all can help. I don’t think this belongs in CS, but I’ll happily defer to mod judgment if I’m wrong.

Like a lot of folks, I’ve done a fair bit of restaurant work in my day, and one of the most almost-literally backbreaking tasks in a restaurant is washing dishes by hand. Plenty of places (especially those that don’t use china plates, like pizza places or burger joints) don’t have dish machines, just the old soap-rinse-sanitizer three-sink set up.

Washing dishes isn’t so bad, really, once you overcome the first day’s squeamishness about other people’s scraps. The only thing that really sucks about it is the fact that you have to lean over the sink to do it. The edge of the sink is about 34-36" high*, and the sink is about 12-15" deep, so you’ve constantly got your back at a 135° angle, and mine gets sore pretty quick.

It seems like it’d be a lot more comfortable to have the sink a bit taller—say, the height of a liquor bar—rather than the height of a prep table. While it’s comfortable to work at a 36"-high prep table, the “working surface” of a 36"-high sink is really the bottom of the sink, not the edge.

By the way, I’m 5’8" and change, so it’s not like I’m taller than the average dish-dog. I sometimes did dishes in a partial splitz, to make myself a few inches shorter, and it was a lot more comfortable for my back (though less so for my legs). I even thought about doing dishes while sitting in a chair, but I doubted the boss would go for it.

Can anyone shed some light here? I’m sure there’s a good reason, but I’m damned if I can think of it.

*I’m estimating these dimensions from memory. Even if I’m wrong, I’m sure you get the general idea.

2

It’s not so much that the sink is low, it’s that the sink is deep. You’ll notice the edge of the sink is the same (or approximately the same) height as the prep tables, and pretty much every working surface in the kitchen. It’s a standardized height that is theoretically “ideal” for a person of average height. It’s also an industry-wide standard that allows individual restaurants to purchase different fixtures at different times from different manufacturers, and know that it will all fit together with some minor adjustments. Equipment is designed with the height and depth (front to back) of these countertops in mind, so that restaurants can purchase things like meat slicers and be confident that the machine will fit on the countertop.

Essentially, the countertop should hit the worker about waist-high. And sinks need to be deep so that large items can be fully submerged in the water (particularly important for the sanitization step). Deep sinks also allow you to pour scalding hot liquid out of a large pot with less risk of splashback (thus reducing the risk of injury). The side effect of this, unfortunately, is that the bottom of the sink is going to be around your knees.

3

Imagine if the bottom of the sink, or even halfway between the top and the bottom, were at the 36" mark. How easy do you think it would be to fill a large pot with soap and water, scrub it out, and then empty it into the sink? It’s a trade off…when you only have to wash a few plates and silverware, it’s harder, but if you have lots of large cooking vessels, it’s essential to have that large area all below waist level.

4

I can tell you, being in Architecture, that the above reasons sound valid but are not the reason sinks are placed at specific heights. It depends on the type of sink and how many similar sinks there are, but the answer is the Americans with Disabilities Act or ADA.

It can get complicated but in a nutshell, a place of business must comply with the ADA. If there are multiple sinks, only one has to comply. If there is only one sink, it must comply. In short, it has to be accessible to a person in a wheel chair (as an example).

There have been many times when I was at work that this became a huge issue. There have been situations where the project was terminated because using a renovated building wouldn’t comply with ADA. The firm I worked for was involved in a huge lawsuit over ADA compliance once. It’s serious business.

5

Restaurant countertops, and thus dish sinks, are built at the same height today as they were being built for decades before the ADA went into effect. They’re designed for somebody working while standing. Kitchen countertops low enough for somebody in a wheelchair to work at would be so low that only somebody in a wheelchair could work at them. I think it’s understood that some kinds of jobs aren’t suitable for somebody in a wheelchair.

If you’re talking about restaurant hand washing sinks, then yes, you’re correct.

6

My experience is that this applies not only to sinks in restaurants and other large scale kitchens but also to homes (along with washbasins and what have you). My theory is they are designed for women who are generally not as tall as men. When I worked in a hospital kitchen I had to sit on a high stool so I didn’t have to bend over double.

7

Health inspector here

The 3-vat sinks must be large enough to completely submerge the largest item that will be washed in it. The 3 vats are for wash/rinse/sanitize and the sanitation step requires complete immersion. Many restaurants use huge stock pots, so I think the sink manufacturers simply make most sinks capable of containing these items. That puts the bottom of the sink fairly low.

8

But it doesn’t explain why the top of the sink is too low for me and I’m not that tall.

9

But restaurant kitchen jobs have traditionally been, and still are, male-dominated. My kitchen counters at home are actually slightly higher than the ones at work.

Back when I was a teenager with a paper route, I did have a customer whose kitchen had unusually low countertops (and low cupboards to match), but he explained it was because the house’s original owner/builder had an unusually short wife, and the kitchen was custom-designed for her.

ETA: This was meant to reply to Floater in post #6, but a couple more posts slipped in while I was typing.

10

It makes it easier for underage to work. :slight_smile: