Bavaria's non-smoker protection law now passed

The small bars in the inner city ARE going to be ones that suffer, correct.

They couldn't have been divided, they have a high proportion of regular smoking customers.
They are in residential areas where there are always neighbours willing to call the police who DO dish out fines for one or two people infinging the noise/freischank laws.

Not bitching at people here but I can't see a lot of the anti smoking militants rushing into "Heidi's Bierstüberl" now for a Weißbier session.

It's allowed for authorities to offer smoking rooms, eventhough they are public buildings... that's rather no incompetence but a reserved loophole for our beloved politicians so they can enjoy there cubans between their meetings.

Oh FFS, do you have to keep banging on about 'anti smoking militants'? If it's right that smoking MPs tried to force an opt-out, then it's fuck all to do with the anti-smokers and completely the fault of a group of inconsiderate dickhead smokers who happened to be MPs that fucked it up for everyone. Typical smoker's attitude.

I know, those damned smokers and their typical attitudes!
Meanwhile your comments are sooo typical of celery eaters. Yes I am looking down my nose at you.

there are as many militant-smokers as militant-anti-smokers FFS!

good that some legislation has been introduced to keep some sort of order.
this new legislation is not telling smokers not to smoke, it's just restricting where they can smoke so it doesn't affect non-smokers. seems fair to me.
and good on some pubs for changing to 'smoking clubs' & to the pubs which have separate smoking rooms.

my (small) local had smokers outside it last night they seemed happy enough chatting quietly to each other before coming back into the pub to their pints.

Celery eaters? this conversation seems to be heading back towards nasty bottom odours. Not that I have anything against lavatorial conversation. Some of my best conversations have been lavatorial. Hell, most of my conversations are.

Except of course, I'm a non smoker who works in pubs so was exposed to smoke.
So the dea that opposition to the way the law is in bavaria comes from "selfish smokers" alone is, as they say, bollix.

I think the number of people who smoke in pubs were a larger number than those who were strongly opposed.
Just the anti smokers were better organised.

Cheers Moonboot for putting it much more calmly and eloquently than I could

Christ MT, stop trying to make it sound like some sort of conspiracy. If you want to sit in a smoky room, go join one of the new clubs. If you want to work in a pub that bans smoking be thankful you now can, but it's hardly some major secret squirrel thing going on

It's not a conspiracy at all. A minority of millitant anti smokers managed to swing major legislation. Clever.
It's part of a social trend that is so tin-hatted its been reported on by the Süddeutsche Zeitung and Munich City Council

Someone running a small inner city pub has to choose to illegally allow smoking or illegally allow people outside
The KVR is already contacting pubs that are trying to become clubs and making threatening noises a those who try and become clubs.
Perhaps some non smokers didn't object going to pubs where there was smoking?
Why should people be forced to choose between sets of friends?
If you want to go to a smoking venue, for whatever reason, wh should you have to register and pay in advance?

The whole point is, there ISN'T a choice.

A lof of pub workers can now work in a smoke free atmosphere.
But some pub workers will have no job at all.
And a lot of the pubs that will be the worst effected, didn't actually have any formal employees.

My boyfriend went to the quiz at the arc last night and said it was so much nicer in there without all the smoke. Might even pop over for a few drinks and dinner now seeing as it's right across the street

it's simple, their smoking punters should just go outside for a quiet ciggy.
that's legal and perfectly 'do-able' seeing as it works in the UK (I've seen this with my own eyes!) smokers can smoke cigarettes quietly even in small local pubs on residential streets.

No Moonboot, it is illegal for people to stand outside!

Mate, in the UK there isn't the very high correlation you get between dense residential areas and pubs as there is in inner Munich.
Neither do you get people who will ring the police at 2305 as there are two people outside the pub.
And neither will be the police dish out 120 quid fines per call out which can break a pub.

Thats just scaremongering. So far I have been to a few bars and the smokers were quite able to go out and smoke quietly without upsetting the locals. They aren't all drunken louts.

@ MT I was out in York doing a pub crawl a few months ago and we went to quite a few small-pubs-in-residential-area type places, the smokers (some of them amongst our group in fact) knew that when they go outside to smoke they should do it quietly which they did. perhaps it's a matter of educating the smokers then?
my two locals in Blackpool are in residential areas.

It has nothing to do with drunken louts. People who have had a drink are NOT quiet outside pubs.
And neighbours DO complain. Do you not recall 101 threads on here about the Kilians bouncers?

Smokers should TRY and be quiet for sure, but they won't be.

I have seen the police turn reguarly up to venues where there have been people outside
and the pubs DO get fined.

The question is, will the noise / freischank laws be dropped to stay in line with the smoking ban?
There is a conflict there. See the interview with Ude in the SZ

Hey MT, you are all doom and gloom... but let's hear it. Put your opinion in the smoking predictions thread so it isn't buried in here... and we can all see who was right 1 year from now...

I've been out a few times in the past week and the whole thing seems pretty unproblematic. It's worked everywhere else, why shouldn't it be fine here? I'm sure once everyone gets used to it, the moaning will die down and people will soon forget what it was like when you could smoke in bars...

QUOTE(HellesAngel @ Jan 8 2008, 1:55 pm)
just to pick up on one point that BadDoggie made earlier, smoking affects 100% of the people in a bar, a point which smokers seem to fail to understand.



am i missing something here - how does "smoking affect 100% of the people in a bar" if there's a smoking ban in place?

Well guess what, I have seen people that have had a few drinks actually manage to go outside and have a smoke quietly. Amazing I know, who would have thought that they could have so much self control!

glad I'm not the only one who's seen that SIM

You are aware of the properties of alcohol as a drug?

It is the "noise" that prompts grumpy evil old Mrs Müller or the new blow in yuppie couple (copyright OB Ude) to call the police.
But it isn't the noise in itself that prompts a fine for the bar at € 175 or so a pop but the mere presence of guests outside the pub after 2300, even if they were SILENT.

SO which part of the grief cycle are actal pub patrons at right now:

Schock, Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Testing, Acceptance?

How long does one think until total acceptance will come in? As has been mention in this thread before this will all be forgotton about in 5 years time.

Dunno if these happy clappy twelves steps rubbish applies to pub patrons.

Some patrons will stay away.
some patrons will go less.

Some patrons will go more.

But I suspect those that go more will not balance out the reduction of thosse that stay away or those go less.
And those that go more are not going to be going to the pubs that suffer worse from the reduction.

MT didn't you already do that?

I wrote my predictions down AGAIN, they've been fairly stable the last year
Perhabs that comes from many years experience in Munich pubs.

Resistance is futile (and annoying).

Surrender to what is.

The Old Europe is catching up.

One notes from the SZ today that the Munich Greens are already making moves against outdoor heaters outside pubs.

And although they say they will tolerate an ashtray outside a pub, there is an oblique warning from the KVR that pubs are not allowed to use areas outside in public that are not their regulated Freischänkfläche. What? Pubs in conflict with the law if they let smokers smoke outside? Where has that been said before?

Is that what it says? You said "pubs are not allowed to use" Implying that pubs can not make use of the area outside of the pub for commercial purposes (like the lamps). Is that much different than the marked areas on Leopold Str. for cafes?

Smokers can still stand outside

Then they are in conflict witth the Freischänkfläche regulations if there is no Freischänkfläche or it is after 2300.

"Das Aufstellen der Heizpilze als Reaktion auf das Rauchverbot sei jedoch grundsätzlich verboten, sofern es sich bei der Stellfläche um öffentlichen Grund handelt.

"Der Freischankbetrieb ist von April bis Oktober festgelegt", erklärt Habl. Außerhalb dieser Zeit dürfen die Wirte ihre Heizgeräte nur auf privatem Grund aufstellen. Gegen einen Aschenbecher vor einer Gaststätte sei hingegen nichts einzuwenden, zumal gehäufte Zigarettenkippen auf dem Gehweg ein Bußgeld für den Wirt nach sich ziehen könnten, warnt Habl. "

http://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/artikel/7/151626/3/

Are people allowed to stand in front of their own apartment blocks and smoke? What about just on the footpath in general? Only in Germany would they fine people for standing in the wrong place.

Except say in the UK where a local council near me forbids smoking on a public pavement within 5 metres of the entrances to its buildings...
Or in Queensland is Australia where there are similar laws...

Or in the US, where you'll see signs to the effect that smoking is allowed only in "designated smoking areas outside".

Can't put up the heaters on public ground = pavement (most of the time that's where the Freischankfläche is located), it's only allowed on your property i.e. backyard, garden... The so called "Freischankfläche" which freely translates as "outdoor-tap-area", is granted only during the time from April to October (officially) and only during this time and within this area publicans are allowed to put up the heaters (same counts for chairs, tables, parasols, ashtrays, but seems like to avoid the littering of the streets outside the pubs and having to fine the publicans every night, authorities will keep an eye closed on the ashtrays).

If I walk between my flat and Sendlinger Tor through the GBV, I'll pass about 18 pubs, ONE of which has private grounds in which they can allow smokers to congregate.

If it's on the pavement/footpath/sidewalk the Freischankfläche needs to be approved by the KVR, so all the pubs who do "serve" drinks outside need to apply for that area and officially would have to follow the according regulations to the Freischankfläche, including no Freischankfläche (no chairs, tables, ashtrays...) from October to April.

Some of the pubs have a freischänkfläche in the summer months, some don't.
But ALL of them are in potentail conflict with the law in thw winter and all of them evn in the summer after 2300.

Three quiet guests sat outside settling their bill with the landlord at 2310?
€ 175 fine.

Totally willkürlich.
While they are there, demand ID off the bar staff cos they "look foreign".
Seen it with my own eyes.

True. Now with the smoking-ban the Freischank-problem during the wintertime even worsened.

Yes. (EDIT: if chairs, tables, ashtrays, etc. are around they could because of these Freischank regulations)

Yep, me too.

I was thinking only the other night that something like this might come up. Cafe am Nordbad had all its Heizpilze on full blast all evening, yet hardly anyone was standing under them. They were heating nothing but the nighttime open air. Thus raising global temperatures. Thus melting the snow. And I was hoping to go snowboarding this weekend. Bastards.

Already banned in Stuttagrt, FFM and Kölle.
I think the Greens were saying each on was the equivilent in CO² of a medium sized car in very heavy use per year.

Ude came out strong against them at a Landlords' Convention earlier this week. They not only emit CO₂ and ruin our beloved leader's weekend, they are also ugly, he said.

The smoking law is, by the way, causing a mass exodus on the Austrian border - in both directions. Tu felix Austria, blessed with mountains, lakes, ski kiosks and cheap gas has proven a haven for smokers. And Austrian non-smokers are taking advantage of the Illiberalitas Bavariae and crossing the border to enjoy a smokefree meal.

Just a qestion folks: On a couple of related posts people have said that government buildings are exempt. Is this true, and if so why?

Yes it is true. Why? Because they don't want to have to give up the fags at work like everyone else.

[img]http://www.welt.de/multimedia/archive/00280/westerwelle_DW_Berl_280967g.jpg[/img]

But aren't government buildings public places?

Because they're fucking hypocrites, the same as politicians all over the world.

Well try to get into one without being invited...

Well last night the Friday Beer Garden group went to the Schwabinger Wassermann and the smoke freeness of the place was fantastic. The place was packed, perhaps the ban has encouraged non smokers to go out more! Seriously, it seems to be working out fine judging by my last couple of trips out. Plus my jeans don't smell like stale kippers!

Weatherspoons / O'Neills / Pitcher and Piano / Slug and Lettuce and all the other identikit chain pubs do well out of smoking bans sure.

why in your humble opinion will these do well and others not?