In a unanimous vote on Tuesday, the U.S. Senate passed a bill, called the Sunshine Protection Act, that could make daylight time permanent next year and bring an end to the long-running, twice-a-year flip.
While the legislation still needs approval from the House of Representatives before President Joe Biden can sign it into law, the move is being welcomed with renewed optimism by Canadian provinces waiting to follow the lead of American states in the same time zone.
I’d invite you to think about what happened in 1973, when the United States briefly experimented with year-round daylight savings time, but Canada failed to follow suit: during that period, 11:30 PM in Buffalo NY was 10:30 PM in Toronto, meaning that Johnny Carson’s talk show was on at 11:30 PM in Buffalo but 10:30 PM in Toronto.
Spoiler alert: that fact alone singlehandedly bank
Canada and the US are too heavily intertwined and interconnected. So DST is not a thing that most provinces or states can unilaterally end for themselves, without taking into account the willingness of their neighbours to make the same switch to prevent complications. Ottawa ON and Gatineau QC are functionally a single metropolitan area, for example — which means the time cannot be different in Gatineau than it is in Ottawa, such that people would to have to adjust their watches just to cross the Alexandra Bridge. Ontario cannot drop DST unless Quebec also drops DST, because Ottawa and Gatineau must be in the same time zone.
By the same token, Ontario cannot switch unless Michigan switches, because the time zone cannot be different in Windsor than it is in Detroit, and the twin Sault Ste. Maris cannot be in two different time zones from each other.
And Ontario cannot switch unless New York switches, because Buffalo cannot be in a different time zone than either Fort Erie or Toronto, and Niagara Falls NY cannot be in a different time zone than Niagara Falls ON.
But New York can’t switch unless New Jersey also switches, because New York City cannot be in a different time zone than Newark. And NY can’t switch unless Connecticut also switches, because the southbound lanes on Highway 120A can’t be in a different time zone than the northbound lanes on Highway 120A. And Connecticut can’t switch unless Rhode Island switches, because the time zone can’t be different in Westerly RI than it is in Stonington CT, and Rhode Island can’t switch unless Massachusetts switches, because the time zone can’t be different in Pawtucket RI than it is in Attleboro MA.
And New York also can’t switch unless Pennsylvania switches, because the time zone can’t be different in Waverly NY than it is in South Waverly PA. And for similar reasons, Pennsylvania can’t go unless Delaware goes, and Delaware can’t go unless Maryland goes, and Maryland can’t switch unless Virginia switches. And going back to Michigan, it can’t switch unless Ohio and Indiana switch, and Indiana can’t switch unless Illinois switches, and Illinois can’t switch unless Wisconsin switches, and on and so forth. (And if you don’t understand why these things can’t happen, check out Google Maps to look at things like where the MI/IN border is in relation to Stateline Road in South Bend IN/Niles MI — spoiler alert, right down the yellow center line! — and where the MI/OH border is in relation to Toledo OH and the “Lost Peninsula” of Erie MI, and where the IN/IL border is in relation to Wolf Lake Park in Whiting IN and Chicago IL.)
Time zone boundaries have to avoid populated areas as much as possible. They cannot be drawn such that cities that are literal neighbours to each other are in different time zones — even with Saskatchewan otherwise not observing DST at all, it had to pass a special law that Lloydminster is on DST, so that people living east of 50th Avenue weren’t in a different time zone than people living west of 50th Avenue. Time zone boundaries cannot divide people from their neighbours.
TLDR: daylight savings time is not a thing Ontario can stop doing unilaterally. It can’t realistically happen until there’s a transnational agreement between Canada and the United States to end it across the board — shit will hit the fan if Ontario doesn’t wait for wider agreement with its neighbours, but Ontario’s neighbours also each have other neighbours besides
It’s one thing in Saskatchewan, where the relatively small town of Lloydminster is its only border complication, so they can just give that one place a special dispensation and otherwise face no problems at all. It’s quite another in Ontario, where four of the province’s ten largest metropolitan areas are within “stay in same time zone or else shit meets fan” distance of its borders with other provinces or states.
Will Canada end daylight saving time since Ontario just passed a bill to do so?
Let’s look at the logistics here because it was, and remains, a really terrible idea.
Ontario went with its current 7 months a year DST scheme because most of the United States did. Back in the 1970s, Gerald Ford tried the same thing, leading to a 1 hour difference between Toronto and Buffalo in winter. The American experience was a disaster as kids walked to school in the dark.
But I digress. Ontario says it won’t switch unless both Quebec and New York do.
Quebec might, but New York switching also poses some massive problems because people from New Jersey and Connecticut frequently commute to New York. New York is unlikely to do so unless both New Jersey and Connecticut do.
And that has another domino effect. Camden is essentially a suburb of Philadelphia, so New Jersey is unlikely to switch unless Pennsylvania makes the switch.
Now, since Atlantic Canada isn’t talking about making a similar switch, that means that Central Canada will essentially be on Atlantic Standard Time year round, which puts Halifax and Windsor in the same time zone in winter.
But it gets worse.
Northwestern Ontario isn’t in the Eastern Time Zone. It’s in the Central Time Zone because that part of Ontario largely centers its life around Winnipeg and not Thunder Bay (which is still in the Eastern Time Zone). That puts northwestern Ontario in the Eastern Time Zone year round, when Winnipeg will still be on DST.
Now, Saskatchewan stays on CST all year round (it doesn’t recognize DST).
And in late October, I was waking up at 7:30 a.m. and it was completely dark. When we went back to EST in early November, I woke up and it was light out. It will get dark again in December, but only for a short period of time. If we go on DST all year round, we will have three months waking up in the dark.