Hubs have many stopover flights where passengers on a short layover can skate into smoking pens to have a quick cigarette and make it back in time for their connection.

"If you're a smoker and you have a 30-minute layover, you're out of luck," Councilman Dave Buhler told Anderson.

"It will help people break the habit," Anderson replied. "You always face opposition until you do it and then everybody looks back and thinks, 'Can you believe we used to allow smoking?' "

In Salt Lake City, Campbell noted, the airport gates are a good distance from outside doors, and if smokers did make the long haul outside they would have to come all the way back through security screening.

"Because we are a connecting hub, it's really not convenient or practical for people to go outside and smoke," he said.

The airport's current pens are set at negative pressure so smoke doesn't escape into the hallways. The rooms provide a good outlet for smokers, who are banned from smoking on commercial flights. If there were no smoking rooms, cigarette addicts would likely light up in corners or restrooms, Campbell said.

"The smoking rooms provide a convenient customer service that allows them to smoke and still protects the rest of the public from secondhand smoke."

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E-mail: bsnyder@desnews.com