building codes are only applied during construction or remodeling. Any state that changes their building code to only allow gender neutral restrooms will only have them on new construction. Existing buildings will continue to exist. Building codes have never been applied retroactively.

You’re asking building owners to redo their restrooms at their own expense, to avoid legal fees? What legal fees? Bathroom crimes don’t exist. And even if they did they wouldn’t implicate the building owner. Your solution is not a solution. Mandating building owners remodel their existing restrooms at their own expense, or having the government fund those changes is a major ask, not a simple sidestep.

The only places that could consider your sidestep are trans friendly places. Those places can instead do the simplest solution of stopping anti-trans bathroom laws, which is why they do that. There’s nothing New York could possibly do to sidestep a bathroom bill in Texas.

Shooting down their bathroom complaints does not stop the transphobes. They need to be opposed directly at every opportunity.