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Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

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Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#61

Post by ashark »

QAPereo wrote: post #34
KGIII wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it really screws with us up here. Once you get up above the meridian, days get pretty short in the winter. Moving those hours around helps exactly none. No farmer has their life improved. It's not saving energy. It's just a dumb setting on the clock.

It would probably take quite some time to prove, but I suspect depression, alcoholism, etc would improve a bit with more “access” to daylight. No one enjoys seeing the sun set by 5, but it probably has a more profound impact on a further subset.

Yeah, but the fix for that is not working nearly as many hours in the winter—which isn’t gonna happen.

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#62

Post by c517402 »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #2

Personally, it would be brilliant if we'd just go to permanent daylight savings time nationwide. The transition is hard on the kids and living in the northern part of the country, the extra daylight is appreciated.

Arizona doesn't participate in daylight savings time. And, we really don't need to be saving any daylight in Arizona.

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#63

Post by shmerl »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #2

Personally, it would be brilliant if we'd just go to permanent daylight savings time nationwide. The transition is hard on the kids and living in the northern part of the country, the extra daylight is appreciated.

Yeah, this whole DST shift is pointless. Just keep it constant but standard, not DST.

Also, I'd prefer a switch to 24 hour time notation. AM/PM is cumbersome.

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#64

Post by kmm »

zeveb wrote: post #54
poulsbohemian wrote: post #2

Personally, it would be brilliant if we'd just go to permanent daylight savings time nationwide. The transition is hard on the kids and living in the northern part of the country, the extra daylight is appreciated.

Why permanent daylight savings time? Why not just permanent real time? Clock noon should be roughly the same as solar noon, all year round. 'Daylight savings' is an impossibility.

I have absolutely nothing to gain from the sun being close to its highest point at 12 o' clock. I have a lot to gain from an extra hour of light in my evenings

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#66

Post by mintplant »

shmerl wrote: post #63
poulsbohemian wrote: post #2

Personally, it would be brilliant if we'd just go to permanent daylight savings time nationwide. The transition is hard on the kids and living in the northern part of the country, the extra daylight is appreciated.

Yeah, this whole DST shift is pointless. Just keep it constant but standard, not DST. Also, I'd prefer a switch to 24 hour time notation. AM/PM is cumbersome.

I switched my own "native" time format to 24 hours years ago, in my head and on all my personal devices. Now I'm able to convert between the two formats effortlessly, and doing mental math on times is easier when I don't have to mix in a bunch of modulo-12 operations.

(I live in the US.)

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#67

Post by zeveb »

kmm wrote: post #64
zeveb wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why permanent daylight savings time? Why not just permanent real time? Clock noon should be roughly the same as solar noon, all year round. 'Daylight savings' is an impossibility.

I have absolutely nothing to gain from the sun being close to its highest point at 12 o' clock. I have a lot to gain from an extra hour of light in my evenings

> I have a lot to gain from an extra hour of light in my evenings.

May I suggest leaving for home earlier?

And a child comment of yours wants an extra hour of light in the mornings. You can't have it both ways! There's a finite amount of light in the day: not everyone can have everything he wants. So why not just settle for making noon be noon, rather than taking an hour from Spooky23 and giving it to you, or taking it from you and giving it to Spooky23?

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#68

Post by tzs »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #2

Personally, it would be brilliant if we'd just go to permanent daylight savings time nationwide. The transition is hard on the kids and living in the northern part of the country, the extra daylight is appreciated.

If kids are a concern, what about the problem of DST in winter in northern areas meaning kids go to school in the dark?

For example I see kids walking to school at around 7:15 AM (6th-8th grade and high school) and around 8:30 AM (K-5th grade).

This is at latitude ~47.7° N (same latitude as the city that is part of your name, in fact).

Here is what various DST options would do in terms of kids going to school before sunrise:

                  Elementary:        Middle/High:
  No DST:           never           Nov 20th - Feb 10th
  Current DST:      never           Oct 10th - Mar 16th
  Permanent DST: Nov 23 - Feb 2nd   Oct 10th - Mar 16th

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#69

Post by zeveb »

chimeracoder wrote: post #58
zeveb wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why permanent daylight savings time? Why not just permanent real time? Clock noon should be roughly the same as solar noon, all year round. 'Daylight savings' is an impossibility.

> Why permanent daylight savings time? Why not just permanent real time? Clock noon should be roughly the same as solar noon, all year round. 'Daylight savings' is an impossibility. Because if my commute involves driving fifty miles east in the morning and fifty miles west in the evening, I don't want to have to adjust my clock by about 5 minutes twice a day. (At the equator, this would be 3 minutes - the further you…

> Because if my commute involves driving fifty miles east in the morning and fifty miles west in the evening, I don't want to have to adjust my clock by about 5 minutes twice a day.

You seem to think that I'm arguing against time zones. I'm not (here, anyway): I'm arguing that the time within a time zone be that of noon at its midpoint, so that no point within the timezone is more than 30 minutes from true noon (yes, some timezone are larger than an hour …), as opposed to those who want permanent DST, or even double DST, where clock noon might be hours from true noon.

Re: Massachusetts is considering leaving the Eastern Time Zone

#70

Post by walterkobayashi »

megaman22 wrote: post #25
KGIII wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it really screws with us up here. Once you get up above the meridian, days get pretty short in the winter. Moving those hours around helps exactly none. No farmer has their life improved. It's not saving energy. It's just a dumb setting on the clock.

It's super depressing in December and January when you get up to go to work in the dark, and by the time you get out at 5, it is pitch dark again. I do wish we'd fallen back earlier, like we used to. I'd much rather have that extra hour of daylight in the morning when I could maybe use it, rather than on my commute home.

I agree, I used to start for work at 6:30 AM and by 4, it'd be pitch dark again. Super Depressing.
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