Park Smoking Ban Outlaws Butts On Pedestrian Plazas, Too!

Scofflaw! (Rob Hoey's Flickr)

Now it all makes sense: First the city bans cars from some of the busiest blocks in NYC, turning them over to bums and tourists. And once New Yorkers come to accept these spaces as lazy plazas, not bustling thoroughfares, the Nanny State moves to tighten its grip. Today Mayor Bloomberg declared that his new law banning smoking from city parks and beaches will also cover pedestrian plazas. Oh, and boardwalks, too. Say goodbye to your postprandial cigar on the Coney Island boardwalk, Boris! What's next for the city's health Nazis, no fatties?

Enforcement will fall to the Parks Department, but the mayor's press release states that "the city anticipates its residents and visitors will follow the new smoking policy on their own. Research shows that 65 percent of New Yorkers favor banning smoking at outdoor recreational places such as parks, ball fields and playgrounds. As with any quality-of-life issue in City parks, however, a violation summons may be issued by the Parks Department when appropriate." But like the open container law, we assume this will just reduce smokers to wrapping a paper bag aground their cigarettes.

The proposed law is subject to approval by the City Council, but it seems likely to pass, since Speaker Christine Quinn and Councilmember Gale Brewer joined the mayor at today's press conference. Moving quickly, Brewer will introduce the legislation tomorrow! If passed, New York will join LA and San Diego in the push for smoke-free public spaces; both cities recently banned butts from parks and beaches. (The law is pretty much blown off in San Diego, apparently.) And smokers, if you think this is oppressive, check out Hawaii, where smoking's banned pretty much everywhere with the exception of your car and house!

But did you know that secondhand smoke is estimated to account for at least 35,000 deaths from heart disease and 3,000 deaths from lung cancer in nonsmokers nationwide each year? Donald Distasio, CEO of the American Cancer Society of New York and New Jersey, also appeared at the press conference, and said in a statement, "Secondhand smoke is a Class A carcinogen and unsafe at any level. The American Cancer Society believes that no one should be subjected to secondhand smoke- period. Smoke free parks and beaches will limit exposure to these cancer causing chemicals and help to keep kids from picking up this deadly habit."

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

By John Del Signore in News on September 15, 2010 2:54 PM

Comments [rss]

OleS

I think the government has more important things to worry about, but hey, go ahead and take a page from Lenin's Red Book and harp on inconsequential matters to divert people's attention from the real issues (like the fact that you are BANKRUPT!)

Mike

I am Jewish and a smoker. I will have you know that this Holocaust is far worse than the one in Germany! Hitler is not half the monster Bloomberg is! Now that I got that joke out there, I must say that Bloomberg is an asshole. Good luck trying to convince me that I gave you cancer in the split second that I passed you on the street with a lit cigarette in my hand.

bigbrooklynmike

you must move pretty fast if you and your cigarette are in and out of range in a fraction of a second. and if you pass someone every day on the way to work or something, those fractions of seconds build up, and then add on the other 50 buttholes who pass by in a fraction of a second every walk to anywhere in the city, and that equals a lot of seconds of smoking someone elses unfiltered butts. i realize i live in new york and i'm basically breathing through a tube connected to a bus tailpipe all day everyday, but you and your smoking compatriot's shit doesn't help anything and neither does your smug i don't give a fuck about anyone other than myself entitlement.

that being said, it's a matter of courtesy, it's not a matter for legislation. it's a transparent money grab in the guise of a nanny state. our town gets so meta sometimes that it's almost meta meta... meta? how many meta's can you stack before it stops working?

Mike

I hope that Bloomberg does eventually pick something that you like and come down on it with this vitriol.

Dogsbody

"No smoking on public sidewalks" will be next...

Then maybe "no smoking in motor vehicles".

Brooklynbobby

Next, we'll have police officers stationed at the checkout lines in grocery stores monitoring what food we buy. Bloomberg is mad with power!!!

pinball29

The Holocaust comparison is appropriate. The Bloomberg admin is putting in rules that affect small segments so that the larger population doesnt rebel. His Gestapo police organization will now be able to meet thier (ridiculously denied) quotas by grabbing smokers and ticketing them for revenue. For all the smug yuppies who say 'well this doesnt affect me, so I dont care' just wait. Eventually Bloomberg and the NYPD will find something in your boring little lives to outlaw. Its only a matter of time before NYC turns into a sterile stupid city for corporate drones who never stray out of the Bloomberg mold. But then, how will the corrupt and out of control NYPD produce revenue? I wonder.....

bashmentgirl

I don't practice Judaism, but I'm offended by your comparison to the Jewish Holocaust.

jsidney

This was discussed in the Gothamist last June. Eleven million people were murdered during the Holocaust. Five million of them were non-Jews.

The expression the Nazis often used was "Jews and other undesirables". The undesirables included homosexuals, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, African-German crosses and people with physical and mental disabilities. Another Nazi goal was the liquidation of all Polish people. Non-Jews of Polish descent suffered over 100,000 deaths at Auschwitz alone. Three million of the six million Poles murdered during the Holocaust were non-Jews.

The 'science-based' hate-mongering used against smokers in our own USA today is patterned on the Nazi hate-mongering based on the science of eugenics in the 1930's. Will it lead to another Auschwitz? Think you can learn to hate smokers enough?

jsidney

I happened to watch a rerun of Polanski's movie "The Pianist" a few nights ago. About the Warsaw ghetto. There's a scene early on where the hero goes to take a girl out for coffee only to find the coffee shop now has a sign that says No Juden. He says to her wryly, I'd suggest that instead we take a walk in the park, but as of last week they don't allow Jews in the park either, and I say, then let's sit on a bench on the street, but they no longer allow Jews to sit on public benches..."

The Jews were targets for oppression and death in Church-driven, superstitious past centuries. The significant aspect of the Holocaust is not that it happened to the Jews, but that this horror happened in a modern-day civilized Western nation. The Holocaust was the end product of a 'science-based' hate-mongering program against a targeted minority by a modern-day civilized Western government. Just like ours.

Sketto

Oh, the Smokers Holocaust is much, much worse. Just ask the smokers how much they've been persecuted. It'll make you cry. Once upon a time, they used to be able to openly foul everyone's air with carcinogens in movie theaters, restaurants, hotel lobbies, airplanes, and just about anywhere they wanted. And now people say that's unacceptable and that you can only smoke in certain places. Oh, the horror. My rights! My rights!

moonbeam

Maybe we should have a telethon or something.

jsidney

The most important thing to remember about the Holocaust is not how it ended, but how it started.

I am appalled when I see Jews like Bloomberg doing the same things to other minorities that were done to his own people in the last century.

bigbrooklynmike

there's a smoking/crematorium joke in there somewhere you missed. ass.

Love2HateNYC

Dumbest comparison ever?

Guest

Dumbest comparison ever?

are you kidding? i've seen way dumber than this (myself included). this isn't the op-ed section of the nytimes.

Cannibal

I'm pretty sure this was an essay written for Complete Bullshit 101 at Aspiring Internet Film Critic and HVAC Training College

bigbrooklynmike

actually, i'd rather they allow the smoking in stationary spots like benches and parks. i can walk around them, I hate it when people smoke walking down the sidewalk, especially when it's crowded and i can't get up wind. I get to smoke the cigarette too, but unfiltered, and i don't smoke so i think that's way more annoying than someone sitting around smoking where you can avoid it.

my .02

jsidney

Bloomberg's new campaign promise: "Vote for me, you smoking scum, and I'll make you really suffer."

TK

Are they going to ticket every tourist or out-of-towner? If not, just say that you're from Michigan and I didnt bring your ID with you, you know in case you get mugged.