{"id":11826,"date":"2026-03-16T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-16T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/how-does-the-time-change-actually-save-daylight-anyway\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T21:32:41","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:32:41","slug":"how-does-the-time-change-actually-save-daylight-anyway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/how-does-the-time-change-actually-save-daylight-anyway\/","title":{"rendered":"How does the time change actually save daylight, anyway?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\u201cPersistence
\u201cPersistence of Memory\u201d by Salvador Dal\u00ed. We could stay on standard time, but then it\u2019d be getting dark at dinner time still in the summer. Or stay on daylight saving time and have it still be dark during our second morning cup of coffee at work in winter.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Dear Action Line,<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whelp, another time change to daylight savings time, another bleary-eyed late-for-work day on Monday. Why on earth do we need to do this time change thing, I hate it. And the experts all say it would be better for our health if we didn\u2019t change the clocks twice a year, especially if we stuck with standard time so that the sun is highest at noon.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2013 <\/p>\n

Sign me, <\/strong>Ticked-Off Time Traveler<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dear Ticked Off,<\/p>\n

This time of year I seem to be about the only one who\u2019s glad we have the time change. But, I think it\u2019s like the Churchill quote about democracy \u2013 it\u2019s the worst possible system except for all the others that have been tried.<\/p>\n

Yeah, we could stay on standard time, but then it\u2019d be getting dark at dinner time still in the summer. Or stay on daylight saving time and have it still be dark during our second morning cup of coffee at work in winter.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s always easy to complain about the way things currently are, but the complaints would be worse if we didn\u2019t change the clocks. In fact, we\u2019ve tried this before \u2013 we implemented year-round daylight saving time from January 1974 to April 1975 to save energy during an oil crisis. The Experimental Daylight Saving Time Act of 1973 proved highly unpopular because of children going to school in the dark and other reasons (see above), and after it was shown that we didn\u2019t really save much energy. A national survey before that experiment found 79% supported the change; after a year into it support was at 42%, and Congress voted to go back to time changes. A similar experiment happened during World War II. Isn\u2019t travel to other time zones worth the jet lag? Sure it is \u2013 same with the time change. Granted, there do seem to be health dangers from interrupted sleep cycles, but it\u2019s dangerous to drive cars to go hiking or to take the kids to go see the grandparents, too.<\/p>\n

I will agree with you about what we call it. You wrote \u201cdaylight savings,\u201d with an \u201cs,\u201d which is how most people say it despite its official name being \u201cdaylight saving time,\u201d singular. Pedantic folks like to insist on the official name, pointing out we are \u201csaving\u201d daylight from early morning to evening, but I think you can just as easily say we are making a \u201csavings\u201d of daylight from morning til evening. The latter is just the noun version of the former verb form, so there\u2019s really no difference, and \u201cdaylight savings\u201d just sounds better. So enjoy your savings, and spend it on an after-dinner walk in the sunlight to go get some ice cream!<\/p>\n

Email questions and suggestions to actionline@durangoherald.com<\/a> or mail them to Action Line, The Durango Herald, 1275 Main Ave., Durango, CO 81301. Today\u2019s Fun Fact: Time zones are a relatively new concept, as during most of human history, localities kept their own time with noon established when the sun was highest in the sky \u2013 sun dial time. In 1675, Greenwich Mean Time was established so mariners could have a means to establish their longitude by comparing their own high-noon time with the time in Greenwich, England (although it took some time and a worldwide contest to develop clocks that could keep these times accurately over the course of weeks and months on a ship). Time zones weren\u2019t established until the age of railroads in the 1800s, when travel speeds increased and time zones were necessary to keep the trains running \u201con time.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cPersistence of Memory\u201d by Salvador Dal\u00ed. We could stay on standard time, but then it\u2019d be getting dark at dinner time still in the summer. Or stay on daylight saving time and have it still be dark during our second morning cup of coffee at work in winter. Dear Action Line, Whelp, another time change […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,994],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-11826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-trueanthem"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11826"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11826\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18551,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11826\/revisions\/18551"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11826"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=11826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}