photo by laurabl
“Dear PoPville,
The massive condo building next door has banned smoking on its property two months ago so now the sidewalk along the building and just south of it (right outside my tiny-by-comparison building) gets several smokers everyday outside with smoke billowing in to our open windows attempting to enjoy the fall temperatures and adjacent woods. While I think it’s great for them, they’ve banned smoking it’s become everyone else’s problem. Instead of having their smokers smoke in their tree circled smoking area they’ve resorted to congregating on the sidewalk, taking up residence at a local pocket park, smoking right outside my building (just south, and just off property of their building) and leave cigarette butts everywhere. I pick up at least 10 per day and this is just in the path of my dog walking.
I too would like my building to be smoke free because we have one resident who is a chain smoker and the smoke freely consumes other floors and units. Now that I see banning smoking on property can be so shitty to neighbors I wonder if folks have better solutions?
I contacted the building next door to ask their residents to be mindful of smoking outside our building and they seemed responsive. However, when I asked an individual planted outside our building smoking – he told me he’s in public right of way and he’s not modifying his behavior. So what’s the recourse? Second and third hand smoking is bad news. Beyond serious health consequences, it triggers migraines and nausea for me. Cigarette butts seep carcinogens into the soil and hurt wildlife, pets and water quality.
Our neighboring building seemingly fixed their problem but made waves of problems for their neighbors. Is there a better solution or am I another NIMBY?”