What's Different ???

[jjkrkwood]

I woke up today and something was Odd. I turned on the TV and all my morning shows were out of synch.

 

WTF ??? Then I noticed on the computer, THE TIME, one hour behind....

 

Damn, when did Daylight Savings sneak up on us ???? (glad it's not Dementia)

[gallahadesquire]

Daylight saving (no final "s") went away, Jjkrkwood.

 

There's been an intermittent movement here in New England, for everything East of New York State to be on Atlantic Standard Time year round (which is what we're on when it's EDT). I'm not sure how I feel about that.

 

Nixon put us on EDT in mid-Winter in '74 (I think ... somewhen between '73 and '75), and it was VERY depressing both to go to work in the dark, AND come home in the dark. So maybe this isn't such a good idea.

 

@Jjrkwood, at least you got to see your shows ... they were just an hour later.

[+ Avalon]

It's hard to keep track anymore. When I was a boy it lasted six months from 2AM the first Sunday in April to the first Sunday in October.

 

Imo DST ought to be abolished. They don't do it in Hawaii and Arizona.

[+ poolboy48220]

Count me among the (apparently) few that like it. I have extra daylight time after work to go outside during the summer, to take my dog to the park. Once it switches back to standard time, I have to rush after work to get to the park while there's still daylight.

 

And while springing forward is slightly rough, I did enjoy the extra hour of sleep Sunday morning when we fall back.

 

It's been ending later to accommodate more daylight on Halloween, I believe.

[+ sam.fitzpatrick]

Growing up in Indiana, we did not have it. Even though I have lived in it for nearly 20 years, I still do not adjust to the change well. I was an hour early to the office today. (Yes, I knew what time it was, but my body told me to get out of bed.)

[P Gren]

It's hard to keep track anymore. When I was a boy it lasted six months from 2AM the first Sunday in April to the first Sunday in October.

 

Imo DST ought to be abolished. They don't do it in Hawaii and Arizona.

Or Saskatchewan ... and that's northern(ish) farm country

[mike carey]

There are several reasons for not having daylight saving. The idea of DST is to move daylight hours from times in the morning when most people don't use it to the afternoon when more people will. The later the sun rises without DST the more people will find their normal wake up time is in the dark. Even people who like the extra daylight in the afternoon are not prepared to lose useful daylight in the morning, so the less attractive DST becomes. In Australia the south-eastern part of the country has DST the north and west don't.

 

Every time zone is a 15° band centred on a meridian divisible by 15, thus 0°, 75° or 150° (the last is where I am). The standard time for each zone is where the sun is directly overhead at noon on the 15° meridian. Where you are in relation to your zone's reference meridian affects how DST works where you are. At the eastern edge of the zone the sun rises an hour earlier than it does at the western edge (as indicated on a clock on 'standard time'). If you're on the western edge of your time zone, your clock time is half an hour ahead of solar time, in effect 30 minutes of permanent daylight saving. Phoenix is at the western edge of the notional longitudes for MST so has almost that 30 minutes of permanent DST. Saskatoon is 16°40" west of the reference meridian for CST so has about 1 hour 6 minutes of permanent daylight saving. (Australia only adopted standardised time zones in 1895, before that time was set separately in each locality. When the NSW and Victorian railways met at the colonial border, NSW railways on Sydney time were about 20 minutes ahead of the Victorian ones, on Melbourne time. Standard times were adopted in the US in 1883.)

 

The closer a place is to the equator the less the length of daylight varies during the year, so the less scope there is for there to be available 'unused' daylight in the morning, and the less reason for DST. Thus places in the tropics have less use for changing time zones for DST.

[+ Avalon]

I remember years back they briefly tried DST year around. But several children in rural areas were killed in traffic mishaps while waiting for the bus in the dark.