Why Massachusetts should defect from its time zone

[MADem]

Sunset before 4:15? It doesn’t have to be this way

AS SUNSET CREEPS EARLIER—it’s down to 6:19 p.m. today in Boston—we’re already dreading what happens a month from now: Clocks turn back. The first Sunday morning, it’s fantastic. An extra hour of sleep! Later that day, though, the honeymoon ends. Why is it pitch black before dinner?

The same weekend we experience these conflicting emotions, Americans in Arizona and Hawaii will do something foreign to most of us: They won’t change their clocks.

They’ve found one time that works for them all year round. Here in New England, we have that option, too. It’s an alternative to the Eastern Time Zone called Atlantic Standard Time or AST. Used in eastern Canada, the Caribbean, and much of South America, it matches the time we already use in the summer, and would simply mean that in the fall, we don’t have to fall back.

The idea of defecting from our time zone might seem strange. Yet the emerging science and the geographic reality of life in New England make it an idea worth serious consideration....


http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/10/04/why-massachusetts-should-defect-from-its-time-zone/zusFxWGPQmwv6bfUb1ssxH/story.html