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Aug 23, 2010
DST all year round
Daylight Savings Time in Israel used to be a big fight every year. Twice a year actually.
For a number of years, this has worked great. No more fighting all the time. It has been great.
The politicians would fight about when to implement DST, and when to remove it. There were those whose main consideration was energy efficiency - having maximum waking and active hours during maximum daylight hours. There were those concerned about religious issues - starting the Pesach seder too late, finishing the Yom Kippur fast earlier in the day rather than later.
A few years ago they finally broke out of the routine and set a law that determined a method of determining, once and for all, when to move the clocks back and forth. The law states:
every year, between the last Friday after the 2nd of April, at 2 AM, and between the last Sunday prior to 10 Tishrei, at 2 AM, the time in Israel will be advanced earlier by one hour.
For a number of years, this has worked great. No more fighting all the time. It has been great.
Now, the law is being discussed again. MK Ronit Tirosh has proposed to change the DST law to say that we should have DST in effect all year round, minus 2 weeks for the holidays. From Rosh Hashana through the beginning of Sukkos we would go off of DST, so everyone can enjoy their holiday, but then during Chol Hamoed we would revert back to DST to take advantage of everyone being on vacation and getting more daylight hours for the activities.
She says this would improve road safety, as more driving would be during daylight hours rather than in the dark, along with the general benefits of being active more during daylight hours and less during dark hours.
DST all year round. Good idea? Bad idea? What do you think?
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What an idiotic idea, sunrise would be around 7:50 Chanuka time with DST, all the kids going to school would be going in the dark. Of course it would affect religious people a lot, the earliest you could start davening would be quite late.
ReplyDelete...and changing for two weeks for the Hagim is totally ludicrous.
ReplyDeleteDumbest. Idea. Ever. Not having DST year-round, but the two-week thing. I thought only Shas could come up with such an idea (they wanted to switch off DST just for YK).
ReplyDeletebesides the idea of the 2 weeks, the rest of the year being on DST is reasonable?
ReplyDeletewhat a stupid retarded moronic idea.
ReplyDeleteand this is what our taxpayer money is going towards.
If these idiots would take some time to do some research they'd learn that in the '70s the USA tried DST all year long and it led to a HUGE increase in traffic accidents and fatalities especially children since they were now walking to school in the DARK - so much so that they cancelled it after one year trial.
If this stupid MK want more daylight hours she should just wake up a little earlier
I never really understood the need for DST anyway. G-d gave us the seasons the way they are - it must be good. Why change it.
And all the nonsense about saving money to the economy. What have you done with the few shekels/dollars you've saved supposedly - I know it all adds up to a few million shekels but that breaks down into a few shekels a piece.
I remember the year they had DST all winter in the States. It was incredibly depressing heading out for school in the dark every day.
ReplyDeleteMK Tirosh shows little compassion for working people who don't have free cars and drivers as the Knesset member, riding buses in the dark every day. And what about the havoc this will wreak for shift workers? Switch over--switch back and total chaos in between.