“I do not understand why they put it here,” Ms. Bobot said. “They could have hidden it.”

The urinal looks a little like a rectangular metal trash can, except that plants can grow out of the bright red top because of the fertilizing effect of the urine, which mixes with the straw inside the can. A small section that protrudes from the side shields men as they take aim.

Kevhoney Fautra, who described herself as a blogger, snapped a selfie with it for her followers. She said the idea of getting men to urinate into a box full of straw rather than on the street was a good one. The execution, well, not so much.

“It’s much better than those smells everywhere,” Ms. Fautra said. “But it’s not well done, it’s aggressive. The red color makes it stand out too much.”

Some in the neighborhood agree with Ms. Fautra and have asked for the urinal to be removed.

But the local mayor, Ariel Weil (each Paris district has its own mayor in addition to one who serves the city as a whole), said that while some “fine tuning” of the location might be needed since the urinal is visible from the Seine, it is not going to be removed.

“I have complaints all the time about people who urinate on the bridges, on the walls,” he said. “Street urination is a real problem.”