Well it's finally going to happen! Next year the Dutch are banning all smoking in all coffeeshops, as well as bars and restaurants. This will help the Dutch comply with EU laws. Other countries have had to do the same. Whether or not this will mean you can't light up anymore is still open to debate as coffeeshop owners insist the ban is only on tobacco. Of course nearly all Dutch smoke their cannabis mixed with tobacco. So now you can't buy booze and you can't smoke in Coffeeshops, the only thing left is to purchase cannabis and I guess sit there and look at it... Have fun in Amsterdam while you still can!!! AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A Dutch smoking ban will come into force in July next year for all restaurants and cafes -- including coffee shops where cannabis is the top attraction, the government decided on Friday. "Coffee shops will be treated in the same manner as other catering businesses. They will be smoke-free," Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende told NOS television. "It would have been wrong to move towards a smoke-free catering industry and then make an exception for coffee shops. People would not have understood that." Establishments will not in fact have to be completely smoke-free. Proprietors will be allowed to set up a separate room or glass partition behind which people can smoke, but customers will not be served there to protect staff. "Employees should not have to work in an environment were they are constantly exposed to the harmful effects of smoking," Balkenende said after the cabinet's decision on Friday. Amsterdam's renowned coffee shops, where marijuana can be smoked openly in a relaxed atmosphere, are one of the city's big draws for tourists. Coffee shop owners argue that the ban only applies to tobacco and was unlikely to hit them hard. Whilst commonly mixed with tobacco, marijuana can also be smoked on its own, especially in pipes, vaporisers and other contraptions. Soft drugs are officially banned in the Netherlands but under a policy of tolerance, buyers are allowed to have less than 5 grams of cannabis in their possession.
Vaporizers should defiantly be allowed. There is also a question whether smoking pure marijuana/hash will still be allowed since the new regulations only prohibit tobacco smoking. And you will still be allowed to smoke at the outdoor patios of coffeeshops. Either way it's still going to be a pain in the ass for most coffeeshops to figure out a way to have a separate room for smoking away from the employees. Since most costumers in Dutch coffeeshops are Dutch or other Europeans and they tend to mix their marijuana/hash with tobacco 99% of the time, it would seem that many coffeeshops will come up with a working solution to the smoking ban before it takes effect in one year.
while i do fear this one day threatening the ability of coffeeshops to sell MJ, I'm trying to be positive about it currently. perhaps coffeeshops in the city center will start curing there weed properly now that the gov't is frowning on mixing tobacco with it.
Uh don't hold your toke on that one... If the Dutch properly cured their weed, it would weigh half what it does, which would mean they'd lose half their income. Can't see that happening in a million years! Plus the Dutch will still mix it with tobacco at home, so they want it wet.
Hey there A.! Yeah, I can just see the coffeeshops expanding their outdoor patios so MORE people can smoke weed in public, yeah right! They already frown upon smoking pipes and bongs outside. Hell I HAD to sit outside most of the time just to avoid all the tobacco smoke in coffeeshops. If they clear out the tobacco smoke, but still allow mj smoke, that would indeed be a GOOD THING, although the Dutch smokers will disagree. I'm sure you'd like less tobacco smoke too, eh? One of the freedoms I got to enjoy in Amsterdam was sitting down outside of a proper business establishment, smoking a doobie or a waterpipe, being served ice cold Westmaller, on a sunny day, blowing my smoke into the stream of pedestrians/tourists reminding them that Amsterdam was once a unique model for personal freedoms. Enjoy what's left of those freedoms while you can.
This is bollocks So what does it all mean essencialy? That you can no longer smoke a joint indoors anywere, but you could enjoy a bong?
Actually you make an interesting point there. Bongs and pipes pollute the air far less than a cig or joint does. The smoke that escapes into the environment is minimized. It would take a LOT of tokin' to fill a room up with smoke from a Bong, yet one cig can do it easily. And of course, we have all the relevant stats from all those studies of cannabis side stream smoke that our gov'ts have sponsored, right? So we know exactly how much safer cannabis smoke is than cigarette smoke, right? How nice that our gov'ts protect us from harm by financing so many studies of cannabis because they want us to know the truth, right?
Nailed it right on the head mate Going back on friday, and I can not fucking wait! Any last minute suggestions as to what coffee shops we should visit?
i cant see this happening to be honest ,its a major tourist attraction.If they banned smoking in coffeshops it would damage the economy big time.I dont think as many people would visit.The coffeshops are a big attraction to amsterdam,its not the reason i visited but i really enjoyed myself i the coffeshops and around the red light district area it was great fun.
They've already stated their position on it. Regulations will be brought in whereby the weed selling counters have to be separated from the smoking area but that's it. There's a topic about it on the forum somewhere.
