Western Railroad Discussion > Don't light up!

From the online edition of the Sioux City Journal:
>Union Pacific bans smoking on company property

NORTH PLATTE, Neb. (AP) -- Union Pacific, the Omaha-based rail giant, has completely banned smoking on company property.

"People can go off the property and smoke," said UP. spokesman John Bromley. "There is no employee testing, but we want to provide a healthy environment.

"We estimate that 25 percent of our employees smoke," he said.


Previous UP. policy had allowed smoking at mechanical facilities, such as those at the company's enormous North Plate rail yard, as long as federal, state and local regulations were followed.

The total company ban took effect Friday.

Union Pacific says its HealthTrack health and wellness program includes smoking cessation help.

Last year Union Pacific began rejecting smokers' job applications.

The company estimates that will save $922 annually for each position it fills with a nonsmoker over one who smokes.

"Looking at our safety records, (we know that) people who smoke seem to have higher accident rates than nonsmokers," Bromley said. "It's no secret that people who smoke have more health issues than nonsmokers."<

What do you do with the reformed smoker? I haven't had one in 28 months. Am I a risk? And it would be interesting to see the safety records on accidents. Seems to be a lot of guesswork in that statement, JB.

BLS

Pretty hard to keep crew members from lighting up in the cab. On another note California prisons went tobacco free this week...well except for the black market that it will surely start. Come to think of it, UP is kind of like prison...

Brian

My building is smoke free, but any hour or the day you can see 10-15 people out back, smoking. I'm sure the company and ee's will save a few bucks in healthcare costs, but that's got to be offset by having so many people outside for smoke breaks a few times a day.

In UP's case, figure a five minute walk to the property line, a ten minute smoke, and a five minute walk back will eat up a chunk of a half hour. If 25% of their people smoke, and half of them take an informal 1/2 hour a day to smoke, that works out to the loss of several hundred PEOPLE each day in aggregate.

It would if people actually paid any attention to it. I predict this will be obeyed just as frequently as the "no smoking in the cab even if both of you smoke rule".