However, it is hard knowing that it will just keep getting shorter and shorter until December 21st. John must routinely be reminded that it's still lighter here than elsewhere, because he's really bummed about the loss of daylight.
I was trying to find the exact time change (they announce it every day on NPR), but couldn't (although I didn't look too hard). Instead I came across a really disgruntled anti-Day Light Savings advocate and his/her site-- http://www.endalaskadaylightsaving.com/
Here are the top reasons he/she gives for the elimination of DLS time... I hope you think this is as funny as I do ;)
THE 1 REASON WE WILL KEEP USING USING DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME IN ALASKA
1. A single Alaskan Legislator, Donald Olson, for reasons he will not explain and is not required to explain, demands we use DST
1. Alaskan's live in " The land of the Midnight Sun".
2. Instant time change disturbs sleep patterns which creates a state sponsored "jet lag" twice each year.
3. There is no longer a clear and compelling need to impact over 683,000 Alaskans twice each year with this law.
4. With creation of the single Alaskan Time Zone in 1983 most of Alaska went on permanent DST.
5. The 1983 time zone change advanced clocks permanently in two of the three Alaskan time zones affected. Now when we advance clocks each year, we create" double" and even "triple" DST in most of Alaska which causes a two hour difference between "sun time" and "clock time" in the rail belt region including Fairbanks and Anchorage and three hours in Western Alaska communities and villages.
6. The 1983 time zone change permanently advanced the rail belt region one hour and northwestern Alaska two hours closer to markets in the lower 48.
7. What savings of daylight? For every hour you gain in evening daylight, you lose an hour of morning light.
8. We gain daylight rapidly in springtime Alaska without DST. According to the (Naval Observatory), rounding to the nearest half hour, both Anchorage and Fairbanks have gained one hour of natural daylight within 8 days of the onset of DST.
9. Advances in communication technology now allow business and personal contact 24/7 to anywhere in the nation or world.
10. Alaska will be in a different time zone with or without DST.
11. Alaska now does business with the Pacific Far East where DST is not used.
12. No Alaskan Utility claims a savings of energy by use of DST. Saving Energy is why the Federal Government allows DST in those states that choose to use DST.
13. DST doesn't save energy on a hot summer day either. (Scientific American March 2009) A portion of Indiana recently went on DST. That portion experienced 1% increase in residential electrical use due to air conditioning increase use when time of sunset delayed.
14. (New England Journal of Medicine 2008) Sweden, a northern latitude populace, experienced 5% increase in myocardial infarction (heart attack) rate in days following onset of DST. This is attributed to disturbance in sleep patterns.
15. Anchorage School District supports ending DST because of impact on students (Committee Minutes 4:06:15 PM Mar 16, 2009 before House Labor and Commerce Committee).
16. Daylight Saving Time is not practiced in every State or Canadian Province. Hawaii and Arizona don't use DST. Saskatchewan has adopted Central Standard Time for year round use.
17. Changing every time keeping device in homes and businesses, including indoor mechanical heating/cooling/security systems, is expensive and time consuming. Link to story about the cost of this. Chrysler scraps clock changing
18. The Legislature cannot control the ocean tides for fishermen, nor the weather that will impact outdoor activity.
19. DST doesn't affect the many devices now using photoelectric sensors that respond to ambient light, not the time of day.
20. Thousands of Alaskans signed a petition asking to vote on this issue and polling data from Dittman Research and Hellenthal & Associates shows majority of Alaskans would support ending DST use in Alaska.
21. Since 1999 this idea of ending DST, when allowed to heard by a legislative committee, has had seven legislative hearings. After being thoroughly vetted, the Alaska House of Representatives passed House Bill 19 in 2009 to end the use of DST in Alaska
Yeah, I think the whole DST thing is silly. Does it matter if you have another hour of daylight in the morning vs the evening? I don't think it does to most of us. Arizona actually made a good collective decision for once!
ReplyDeleteChina doesn't use daylight savings. and any place using the name China (mainland, macau and hong kong... and taiwan, too, regardless of your opinion of their sovereignty) is on one (yes, one) time zone.
ReplyDelete