If lounge was opened, the state of the forum would worsen. People would intentionally join just to spam some random questions in lounge.
As many regulars have said, lounge should just be deleted. The forum isn’t meant to be a casual chat room, it’s meant to be a professional environment for developers. A lounge has nothing to do with development, and does nothing to contribute to the forums environment.
I still support making off-topic posting have a harsher punishment, but we should punish off-topic posting, not encourage it by opening up the lounge.