@cwilbur and @zaku… I hear ya… but to follow thru on that line of reasoning, then I’d expect all toilets to be installed at the higher elevation, not just the wheel-chair accessible ones (as a corollary to this urinal thing).
Furthermore, can’t speak for anyone else, but I expect that there’s a lot of variability in how guys aim… some down at the drain, some at the back, and everywhere in between. Radius of spray would then fluctuate accordingly… after all, nobody wants to mess up their pants/shoes if they happen to fall inside the blast radius.
And of course, there are those all-the-way-to-the-floor urinals which have gotta be approaching infinite blast radius as that extreme is reached. ;-)
Anyway, back to point… are janitors really polled for input to the installation? I figure it’s up to one of two people… the architect and/or the installing plumber. And for either of those, I’d think there should be some (pseudo-)scientific principal. For example, countertop height is consistently done in applications across the US (the world?) as it’s known where people “expect” the top of a counter to be.
You’re probably exactly right though… I’m just holding out for more.