Determining No-Smoking Areas at UNC

Todd Kesselring

12/6/2007

• As of January 1, 2008 UNC will enforce a smoking ban, “in the outdoor areas controlled by the University up to 100 feet from University facilities. This includes any facility in which the University leases the entire space.” UNC claims, “the practical effect of the policy is that the campus will be smoke-free.”

*October 23, 2007 email, Ray Hackney, Interim Director of Environmental Health & Safety and Claire Miller, Senior Director of HR Services

…is it true?

• Assumptions:– ‘Facilities’ are buildings– The University cannot control public right of

ways

• Created buffer tool to answer the question– Tool is designed to create a new shapefile

with 100ft buffers around a UNC building shapefile.

– Further analysis included:• Selecting UNC parcels• Clipping ‘no-smoking’ zones with parcel

boundaries• Calculating areas of both parcels and ‘no-smoking’

zones and comparing them• Further analysis was done of an arbitrarily defined

‘main campus area’

Smoke Area Stats

• 2797 UNC acres

• 566 or 20.25% smoke free

• ‘Main Campus’ is 575 acres 382 of those, 66.4%,are smoke free

Conclusion:

There are Still Loopholes for Smokers

• UNC should be concerned about what areas of campus smokers are pushed toward with this policy