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by SmokeyTheBear
on Fri Dec 11, 2009 9:21 am |
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Despite the fairly draconian smoking ban in Toronto, establishment owners remain sympathetic.
During the warmer months nearly every restaurant and coffee shop with enough space has a patio where smoking is permitted. Even in colder months there are butt disposal bins and huge metal ashtrays outside building entrances.
At places such as hospitals you will routinely see people in blue medical uniforms having a cigarette outside. During a recent sleep study I was permitted an extended smoke break before settling down to sleep.
Nine out of 10 people I talk to in professional service capacities, such as taxi drivers, say: "I quit eight years ago [or five, or however many] but I have no problem with you smoking where it's legal." Sadly, it's not legal in a taxi, but on out-of-town taxi rides where the fare is at least $100, permitting the passenger to smoke while the taxi is on the freeway and beyond municipal jurisdiction is customary all over the province.
I think people have gotten used to the idea that a hard one-fifth of the population chooses to smoke and always will until and unless smoking as such is outlawed, and only the tiny lunatic fringe of anti-smoking nuts has a problem with it. Unfortunately, it's that lunatic fringe that occupies all the positions of power.
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SmokeyTheBear
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by flex
on Tue Dec 22, 2009 3:53 pm |
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Quote: Despite the fairly draconian smoking ban in Toronto, establishment owners remain sympathetic.
Fairly draconian?
More like bringing it to the attention of smokers that they are not welcomed.
SOME establishment owners may in fact be sympathetic but they will not risk the huge fines so visiting smokers will not going to find Toronto to be a smoker friendly place.
Far from it. Same goes for the Ontario.
Quote: During the warmer months nearly every restaurant and coffee shop with enough space has a patio where smoking is permitted. Even in colder months there are butt disposal bins and huge metal ashtrays outside building entrances.
This statement sound much better than the actual reality is.
Most restaurants and coffee shops DO NOT have a patio where smoking is permitted.
As a matter of fact, well over 80% of them do not have a patio where smoking is permitted.
The relatively few which does exist are not allowed to have even an umbrella to protect smokers from rain or sun.
As for butt disposal bins? Fewer and fewer buildings entrances have them.
In fact would dare to say that they are becoming fairly rare.
What is no longer rare is no smoking signs outside which states that smoking is prohibited from so many meters from the door. Some as much as 9 meters and once again it makes sure that smokers will not be protected from the elements.
At places, side walk is painted to tell smokers as to just how far they expected to keep away from the entrance. 1 meter is 3.28 ft. One major shopping mall I know of, not only banned smoking outside 9 meters from the door like all other major shopping malls(roughly 28 ft and no protection from the elements at all) but banned it outside altogether. Including in the parking area, which means Your car as well.
No, Toronto is not s smoker friendly city at all. Far from it.
Quote: At places such as hospitals you will routinely see people in blue medical uniforms having a cigarette outside. During a recent sleep study I was permitted an extended smoke break before settling down to sleep
Every hospital I know of banned smoking outside on it's entire property.
Parking lot included.
In the downtown core that outside area property may not be huge, but away from that core, which would include most of the city, it is a long, long walk.
Similar story all over Ontario.
Quote:
Nine out of 10 people I talk to in professional service capacities, such as taxi drivers, say: "I quit eight years ago [or five, or however many] but I have no problem with you smoking Nine out of 10 people I talk to in professional service capacities, such as taxi drivers, say: "I quit eight years ago [or five, or however many] but I have no problem with you smoking where it's legal." Sadly, it's not legal in a taxi, but on out-of-town taxi rides where the fare is at least $100, permitting the passenger to smoke while the taxi is on the freeway and beyond municipal jurisdiction is customary all over the province
The taxi driver may say that however the " where it is legal " part of that sentence is the real thing visitors who smoke may find annoying.
Btw; Recently a truck driver driving his own truck while being alone was pulled over and fined for smoking on the freeway because his truck belonged to his business.
No, this province is not a smoker friendly province and outdoor bans no longer so rare.
Finding hotel/motel rooms which allow smoking is also getting to be ever more difficult.
While it is becoming more and more difficult in North America to find smoker friendly places, Toronto and Ontario in general can be considered to be a very unfriendly place for smokers to visit.
Quote: I think people have gotten used to the idea that a hard one-fifth of the population chooses to smoke and always will until and unless smoking as such is outlawed, and only the tiny lunatic fringe of anti-smoking nuts has a problem with it. Unfortunately, it's that lunatic fringe that occupies all the positions of power.
I fully agree with that part of the post.
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by SmokeyTheBear
on Tue Dec 22, 2009 4:53 pm |
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Although most restaurants and coffee shops don't have patios at all, the ones that do and that I've dealt with are sympathetic to smokers. Maybe I've just been lucky, but I know of a dozen places not far from here where I can smoke on patios when weather permits. And there's lots of places with sun umbrellas that permit smoking under the sun umbrellas. The by-law covers things like building overhangs and awnings, not umbrellas.
Although there are signs posted outside many establishments, enforcement is nearly nonexistent. Pretty much everywhere you go in Toronto you find people smoking right outside building doors. When I was at the hospital I mentioned (and, for obvious reasons, I'm not going to identify it) not only patients and visitors but staff were smoking far less than 9 metres from the entrance, and nobody seemed to care.
The rule against smoking in your own car in a mall parking lot is kinda silly and I hadn't heard of it before. The anti-smoking Nazis don't have nearly enough manpower to snoop on every one of the thousands of cars in mall parking lots to sniff out smokers, so there can't be too much enforcement of that.
When I took a GO Bus recently, not only was I able to smoke right on the platform where the bus was going to be loading, but at a scheduled stop the driver permitted me to exit the bus to have a cigarette while he waited for his scheduled departure time. Not only did he not force me to move off GO Transit property but he told me "Don't wander away." The only restriction he put on me was that I reboard the bus immediately when he was ready to go.
On one occasion, I took a Greyhound late at night. There were only two passengers, and all three of us (the driver and two passengers) were smokers. Since we were getting off prior to arrival at the bus station and the driver planned to head straight for the garage upon dropping us off, we all smoked for most of the trip.
I don't know much about hotel rooms in Toronto, since I live here and haven't needed to research hotel rooms here, but in other Ontario cities it is not only possible but easy to find a hotel or motel room in which smoking is permitted. Yes, they're becoming more and more uncommon, but the Nazis face an uphill battle to shut down all smoking on quasi-domestic properties.
I do agree that this province is not smoker-friendly, and you'll find no shortage of brainwashed idiots who will approach a random stranger and blather: "You should quit. It's not good for you"--as if they have a clue about what's good and not good for them beyond the propaganda they've been spoonfed. But, in general, I don't find things to be as bleak as you suggest because, regardless of the letter of the law, ordinary people on the ground operate on a basis of common sense.
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by flex
on Fri Dec 25, 2009 4:44 pm |
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A stand alone umbrella is allowed.
Actually, meant a canopy which is a much better protection than a stand alone umbrella but realize that I used the wrong word.
Anyway, those stand alone umbrellas provides very little protection and not that many of them are really around.
The situation You describe is as far as I can see to be the case in some sections of the downtown core of the city which is overall a relatively small area of Greater Toronto.
Simply call it the way I see it and because of the letter of the law, it is bleak in my opinion.
Also because the letter of the law, as well as the governments actions on top of the lobby groups from several tax payer funded powerful organizations, it is not very likely to get much better.
Far more reasonable to assume, that because of those organizations and the letter of the law, it will get worse.
The bus driver You mentioned is an exception to the rule and not the other way around.
Enforcements are spotty to be sure but would not call it nearly non existing.
For example, was aware that several cab drivers decided to enforce the letter of the law, something they did not done much before, after a blitz from the health gestapo agents which resulted in tickets.
One was to a driver sitting in a parked cab, while the door was fully open and his legs was outside.
It will only take one person to complain and that rare breed of bus driver will change.
Unfortunately.
The mall in question is owned by Cadillac Fairview, which owns several other malls.
As far as I know, it is largest mall and plaza owner in the city and perhaps in the Province.
That same plaza which is now smoke free inside and out was in fact the first plaza which banned smoking inside. As proudly announced by the company.
Before the mandatory bans.
Also overheard two employee's talking outside of an other mall, while on a "smoke" break discussing the number of employee's quitting because of the outdoor ban in that mall.
Both worked there just prior to the outdoor ban.
Enforcement is nearly nonexistent?
A personal experience with more than just one security guards also tells me otherwise, although I do agree that most ordinary people do not care.
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by Cancionila
on Thu Mar 11, 2010 3:50 pm |
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| Although there are signs posted outside many establishments, enforcement is nearly nonexistent. Pretty much everywhere you go in Toronto you find people smoking right outside building doors. When I was at the hospital I mentioned (and, for obvious reasons, I'm not going to identify it) not only patients and visitors but staff were smoking far less than 9 metres from the entrance, and nobody seemed to care. |
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Cancionila
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