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Comment by ludicrousdispla | Hacker News Reader

The last time I walked into a hotel room that smelled like cigarette smoke was in 1998, so I would think this is very uncommon.

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Using an ozone generator you can remove all odors in a medium sized room in less than 30min. Only poorly organized cleaning staff would have this issue.

Which makes me ask why we even need smoking fees then?

I thought it was a little tougher than that? I know it costs at least a few hundred bucks and takes a day or two to ozone a small apartment, which would roughly line up with the $500 fine this hotel charges.

An ozone generator itself doesn't cost much and the only recurring cost is the power it draws, which is also low (dozens of watts).

I had one in 2022. I immediately asked for a different room.

In last 4 years I've been to rental apartment in Montenegro that left smoke smell on my backpack for multiple days, and in really badly smelling 3-star hotel room in North Macedonia (both in capital cities)

I can't recall the last time. Smoking in the US is way, way down. Not gone, to be sure, but it was crashing even before vapes.

In particular, it’s way, way down among the cohort of the population that have lifestyles amenable to staying in hotel rooms.

Truck drivers and lots of trades crews (e.g. linesmen) stay in hotels all the time. But typically they are not staying at the Hyatt.

There is a whole tier of hotels and other services targeted at the traveling working class which you won't encounter as a highly paid tech professional simply because your company won't book you there.

I chatted with a motel owner in the middle of nowhere, Arizona who made his yearly nut off seasonal melon pickers, usually Mexican nationals on agricultural work visas. They need a place to stay, too. Otherwise, he had the kind of quiet, far out of the way old motel you see in horror movies (which I particularly love) and the odd foreign film set in America.

I ran into traveling road crews (as in CalTrans contractors building highways) visiting a facility for my current employer. Interesting crowd. The pay is good, and the only real requirements seem to be the willingness to wake up early, work hard, and not be insufferable to work with.

When you just need a shower and a bed there's nothing wrong with the old roadside motel, the kind where each room opens directly to the outside and you park right in front of the door. Mostly long gone, though a few remain here and there.

I wouldn't be so quick to say that. Depends on the pricepoint of the hotel, the cohort with lifestyles amenable to staying in hotel rooms varies from business travel to escorts and drug dealers.

Last time this happened for me was 2024. Note to self, don’t buy the cheapest hotel possible. It will smell like a blunt wrap.

Come to Vietnam mate.

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