Letter to the Editor: Let’s stop changing the clocks

I read with interest the opinion of Thomas Knapp about ending the “Spring Forward, Fall Behind” madness we endure twice every year. I agree, we should stick to a standard and be done with it. And it seems science also agrees with us.

But while Knapp, along with much of Congress and many Americans, says they prefer DST to be all year round, I prefer early morning daylight as opposed to having daylight until 9 p.m. or later in the summer, and there is history to back me up on this.

In late 1973, 79 percent of Americans said they preferred year-round DST, and President Nixon, wanting to curb energy consumption during the energy crisis, signed it into law for two years.

However, in 1973 President Ford repealed that law, as public approval for year-round DST had plummeted to 42 percent. Here are some of the real world consequences of year-round DST that we experienced:

Many schools ended up delaying start times because of the early morning darkness, forcing families to scramble to change their schedules.

There was a notable increase in traffic accidents. And eight children in Florida, and others elsewhere, were killed while walking to school in the dark.

And it proved to have little to no effect on energy consumption and may have actually increased gasoline consumption.

So while I know many who prefer more daylight in the evening, we seem to have forgotten we tried this once before. People ended up hating it, parents were outraged, and it ended up failing miserably.

By all means, let’s stop having to turn our clocks back and forth. But let’s pick the better option of ending DST permanently and remember that what may have sounded like a great idea in the summer won’t be so great in the winter, when the sun won’t come up until 8:30 a.m. and it will still get dark again by 6 p.m. We need to learn from history, not repeat the mistakes of the past.

John Moore

Newton