Daylight savings time and boating

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Most proposals I've seen to kill the DST change have leaned towards making summer time (DST) the permanent time and scrapping standard time.
Agreed, but that takes congressional approval. Scrapping DST doesn’t. That’s why it’s being discussed. It’s the second best solution so to speak.
 
Most proposals I've seen to kill the DST change have leaned towards making summer time (DST) the permanent time and scrapping standard time.
Why is that?
DST daylight savings year round would agree with my winter sleep cycle. Today I apparently missed the sun coming up behind the clouds.
Except for those that get up early and go to bed early DST would be better in the second half of the day.
Kids still walk to school?
I remember walking in two feet of snow uphill both ways, but not the kids for the past 30 years as attested by the traffic jam of parents dropping them off.
 
From an Alaska perspective, light is light and dark is dark. My mother visited me once in Fairbanks during July. As we were walking across the airport parking lot about 8:30 PM she asked when it was going to get dark. The only thing I could think of was sometime in August. In December a friend visiting from Hawaii, commented about the beautiful sunrises and sunsets. My response was they are not different events. Living in Idaho now, I only worry about what time I need to get up to go hunting.

Tom
 
Permanent DST was tried decades ago. It was a disaster and most people hated it so much it was all quickly changed back. In the modern era, DST makes no sense at all, and has lots of drawbacks. Noon is solar apogee and always has been. Don't like mother nature's rhythms? Then adapt your schedule how you want on your own time.
 
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Does it really matter for boating as the OP posited? Arbitrary settings on a clock do not impact the sunrise and sunset. Whether the clock shows an hour earlier or an hour later is pretty irrelevant to me. Less is more in this case.

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Yes sir, that's why I own some property in Costa Rica, where the sunrise and sunset times don't vary much and DST is not observed. When I build a house and start spending the winter there I will always be happy!! We will talk more about latitude selection after the next hurricane. Anacortes, too far north. Costa Rica, too far south :cool: Stay safe out there!
Regards,
Scott
Some of us believe Anacortes is just about perfect..... lol.
 
None of you remember when the USA went on year round DST winter of '74 - 75. Did NOT work out at all, and it quickly went back to the normal way. What a flippin disaster for northern states. When the kids waiting for busses in the pitch dark started getting hit - and some of them dying (like the kid in my 7th grade class), suddenly the idea changing the clocks twice a year isn't any big deal. Just about everything we use in the modern world for timekeeping has a DST time changeover built in anyway, and the system works well. Sign me - Been there, done that, complete BS. Leave the clock system alone. There are bigger problems to solve...
 
I am not sure how other boaters in different time zones feel about the possibility of the incoming administration doing away with DST, but lots of my cohorts and I here in the eastern side of the central time zone will be missing the later time of sunset in the summer if DST goes away. Even as it is now we dread the end of DST every fall as soon 4 PM is near twilight when all good boaters want to be home. With days like today, 15 December in the 70's we can jump on our boats and run around the bays and Gulf fishing or whatever, but that danged early sunset is always getting in the way. What we'd like to see here is permanent DST for our area.
Still the same amount of daylite no matter what your watch says. Just adjust your own schedule, that is the proven healthiest way to act.
 
Now that I am retired... clock time is irrelevant to me (except for a rare appointment). Daylight and night determine what I do... not a clock.

When cruising... I got going at daybreak....went to bed sometime after sunset...following the same routine RVing.

Length of day/night is really the more important factor to me, so setting a clock to adjust my routine that is based on something absolute to me is silly.

Keep it or get rid of Daylight Savings...... doesn't really affect me at all.
Unless you are a day tripper that needs to be back on shore at a specific time; this is a ridiculous issue. The Sun comes up… first light; the Sun goes down…sunset. If you do not travel after dark or before first light, the artificial clock time is irrelevant.
 
I am not sure how other boaters in different time zones feel about the possibility of the incoming administration doing away with DST, but lots of my cohorts and I here in the eastern side of the central time zone will be missing the later time of sunset in the summer if DST goes away. Even as it is now we dread the end of DST every fall as soon 4 PM is near twilight when all good boaters want to be home. With days like today, 15 December in the 70's we can jump on our boats and run around the bays and Gulf fishing or whatever, but that danged early sunset is always getting in the way. What we'd like to see here is permanent DST for our area.
Just leave an hour earlier
 
I am not sure how other boaters in different time zones feel about the possibility of the incoming administration doing away with DST, but lots of my cohorts and I here in the eastern side of the central time zone will be missing the later time of sunset in the summer if DST goes away. Even as it is now we dread the end of DST every fall as soon 4 PM is near twilight when all good boaters want to be home. With days like today, 15 December in the 70's we can jump on our boats and run around the bays and Gulf fishing or whatever, but that danged early sunset is always getting in the way. What we'd like to see here is permanent DST for our area.
Isn't most of the talk about getting away from changing the clocks and moving to year-round DST? I expect states that don't want it can opt out, like Arizona does now. Sure will make things more interesting.
 
We Floridians voted to have permanent DST but it'll never see its way to a vote in Congress.
 
When I was delivering longer distances, most (all?) important USCG and NOAA announcements were in UTC so I always kept one clock set to UTC. Eliminated a lot of confusion on a boat.

Guessing not too many votes to settle on UTC and the hell with time zones and DST adjustments......

Peter
 
I lived for a few years when I was a kid in Kentucky. Not the far north for sure but not south either. In the winter, we were at school before sunrise which meant we were waiting for the bus in the dark. I suspect the school schedule was impacted by desegregation bus schedules to move kids all around the county.

Even when I lived in a very southern state, I remember riding my bike to school just before sunrise. There was some light but it was still more dark than light. To be fair, I got to school before most kids since, I wanted my second breakfast. :)

Just set the time so we have more evening daylight in the winter and leave it alone or split the difference. Changing the clock twice a year really messes me up for a few weeks.
 
The problem for all you people that have problems with or without the time change... is not the change of time itself. It's that you have too much work perhaps. When you dispatch of work (I did so by becoming unemployable), all of a sudden it doesn't matter what time you start to do things...

Address that instead !
 
I am a year from that state. I love wearing a watch, but I am looking forward to not caring what time it is.
 
It won't matter. People just like to complain. That won't change.

As was already pointed out, we manage to adjust to traveling to another time zone. Having to make a small adjustment twice a year is hardly an inconvenience worth arguing about. My take is that it's just something politicians can use to distract us, and make it seem like they're doing something. Of all the things that need fixing, this one is pretty far down on my list.

Change it, don't change it, eliminate it, I don't care. I just wish we could move on to some things which really matter.
But don't you see CaptTom, it really, really does matter. 😊
 
I am a year from that state. I love wearing a watch, but I am looking forward to not caring what time it is.
I find the cheif use I have of my watch is telling me the date. With clocks all over cars, boat, house, and even a red time cast onto the ceiling in the bedroom from the alarm clock, time is all over the lot.
 
That was made up by southerners....there are actually real reasons why people in the hotter northern areas of the country don't want Daylight Savings.
Absolutely right Serene. And Bruce, please stop quoting that silly Peterson line...”that it would fade curtains prematurely, and put the chickens off laying.” It was always rubbish, and everyone knew it.

What’s the use of extra daylight at the end of a hot day, when all you want is the damned sun to go away so things can cool down a bit. Also, in the northern latitudes there’s effectively no twilight, so dark comes so quickly it minimises that extra hour’s light benefit anyway.

But even in NZ, I hated DST, as being a GP, I saw repeatedly the adverse effects on the kids and mums who were frazzled out by the end of summer, as the effect of getting up earlier, but getting to sleep no earlier accumulated. Heck, all my young days we did not have DST, yet were still able to play tennis without lights up to 8.30pm in summer because there was a decent twilight
there.
One of the joys of moving to Queensland Australia from Hawkes Bay NZ was NO DAYLIGHT SAVING..!
For once I’m actually with your president elect.

As to the objection one poster raised - that when going on holidays you have to adapt to different times zones - that’s the one time it’s ‘cool’. Because it emphasises you are actually away somehwere different, and you are not trying to observe normal routines anyway. I definitely support the concept of setting the clock to the best compromise for the zone, then leave the damn clock alone..! Cheers, Pete B
 
I would like to get rid of it since it gets dark so early in the winter.
I live in Alaska and work in the Arctic so I can confidently say you guys dont know what light or dark are. Summer daylight 24/7. Winter dark 24/7 thats your choices so an hour more daylight in August or less daylight in April is not anything we up here get to excited about. Just sayin'!
 
We Floridians voted to have permanent DST but it'll never see its way to a vote in Congress.
I missed it. Was it a ballot referendum or legislative action? When did that happen? Apparently, by your response, it is up to the Federal gov't to set the time. Yes? Rats! I do heartily support staying on DST all year. Maybe we should secede from the Union and be done with it? As the Governor says "Welcome to the Free State of Florida".
 
I missed it. Was it a ballot referendum or legislative action? When did that happen? Apparently, by your response, it is up to the Federal gov't to set the time. Yes? Rats! I do heartily support staying on DST all year. Maybe we should secede from the Union and be done with it? As the Governor says "Welcome to the Free State of Florida".
If I recall, one of the more recent attempts by Congress to change it was a senate bill that was co-sponsored by Marco Rubio from FL and Patty Murry from WA. Amazing to get those two agreeing on anything.
 
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