Coffee and Cigarettes

          Culture has and will always evolve organically. The values and pastimes of a people are always subject to change as they are handed from one generation to the next. Today one such metamorphosis is taking place in the city of Vienna. Due to public safety concerns over the accessibility of city businesses and footpaths, traditional Viennese sidewalk cafes are being threatened by government lawmakers. On the surface this relatively mundane legal maneuver could be dismissed as putting cafes in a position of minor discomfort, yet upon closer inspection the underlying significance of the proposal comes into focus.

            Austria could be called the coffee capital of the world. The nation boasts responsibility for the invention of filtered coffee. One of the first coffee houses ever to open was established in Vienna c. 1685. Since then coffee houses have been an integral part of the Viennese cultural landscape. These were and still are simply places to pass the time reading the news, socializing, ordering unique Austrian coffee drinks. It was in the 1950’s with the increased popularity of television that their patronage began to wane. More recently chain espresso bars like Starbucks have also drawn customers away. Tradition and tourism are two of the only things lending the coffee house culture its present vitality.

Lawmakers might further curtail the traditional appeal of privately owned cafes out of concern for public safety. Summer in Vienna is the time of year when sidewalk cafes come out of hibernation. It is a well loved aspect of Viennese life for natives and tourists alike. They are admittedly impractical, however, as they cause urban congestion and obstruct access to participating businesses. Consequently, government ordinance may well have these perennial verandas of Vienna altogether uprooted. Furthermore, this issue ties not only to local culture but to local economics as well. Sidewalk cafes are a huge source of business for the city, and it is feared that the proposed legislation would alienate customers, particularly smokers.

Following a 2009 smoking ban in Austria, smokers have had fewer and fewer places to engage in their favorite vice. Sidewalk cafes are among the last havens for smokers seeking a venue for public consumption of tobacco. Concern for the smoking public may seem odd to an American reader, yet the context is quite different for Austrians. Austria is the world coffee capital as well as a world smoking capital. Appropriate, considering the close bond that coffee and cigarettes share. A smoking census taken earlier this decade put them at number one with smokers making up 36 percent per capita, more than twice as many as America’s 17.5 percent.

Another odd facet of this proposal is the government’s apparent willingness to deal a blow to a cultural institution, especially in Europe where traditional mores tend to be held in high esteem. American culture is embodied by corporate chains like Starbucks and McDonald’s to the point of borderline cultural imperialism as they spread to other nations. American values and pastimes are corporate owned; easily established yet difficult to regulate, dilute, or replace.


http://www.austriantimes.at/news/Panorama/2012-02-17/39585/Vienna_sidewalk_cafes_under_threat