PETITION FAVORING CENTRAL TIME (short winter days)

Title: Time Zone Boundaries in the State of Indiana
Docket: OST-2005-22114-3843 (as corrected)
RIN 2105-AD53
FR Refence Number: 70 FR 48460

To: Joanne Petrie
via "http://dms.dot.gov/submit/"
Office of the General Counsel (C-50)
400 7TH ST SW
WASHINGTON DC 20590-0001

PETITION FAVORING CENTRAL TIME (short winter days)
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I was reading Tony O'Neill's November 25 comment to the DOT docket (OST-2005-22114-3559). Tony lives in Indianapolis. As an objection to Central time, Tony says that if he lives in a state where the sun sets at 4pm, he is "out of here". Well, even on Central time, the sun won't set that early in Indianapolis, so this is a bit of a "straw man" argument, but let's take a closer look at this objection anyway, because there are quite a few who seem to feel this way.

I maintain that Tony's issue has more to do with reasonable expectations for living on the 40th parallel than it does with Indiana's time zone.

The shortest day of the year north of the equator is December 21 (winter solstice). At 40 degrees latitude, we only get about 9 hours 20 minutes of daylight. No matter where you live around the world at that latitude, you will only have about 4 hours 40 minutes before midday and the same after. So at the center of any time zone, the sun rises approximately 7:20am and sets approximately 4:40pm. For those east of the nearest center, like Indiana is, sunrise and sunset times are up to 30 minutes earlier. For those to the west, they are up to 30 minutes later.

Since Indianapolis is only about four degrees east of the nearest time zone center, our actual sunrise and sunset times should be about 15 minutes earlier than those at the center. This would be about 7:05am and 4:25pm (ignoring the correction for the equation of time).

It turns out that the earliest sunrise in Indy on Central time is 4:20pm (including the equation of time correction), which matches the approximate calculation very closely.

So, for all of us who choose to live near Indianapolis (or anywhere due east or west of it), physical reality just dictates that we're going to have less than ten hours of daylight from mid-November through late January -- with the attendant winter sunrise and sunset times approximately five hours or less before and after midday.

If Tony O'Neill, or anyone else, comes to realize that they really want more daylight than this in the winter, setting the clock to eastern time doesn't really address the root problem. It only robs an hour from Peter (who prefers to have 4.9 hours of early-January morning sun instead of 3.9) to pay Paul (who wants to stretch his 4.3 hours of early-December evening sun to 5.3).

On Central time, we would have about 0.6 hours more mid-winter sun in the morning than in the evening. On Eastern, we would have about 1.4 hours more sun in the evening than in the morning. Central helps keep the scale a little closer to the center, more equitably dividing our scant hours of winter daylight between those who prefer it in the morning and those who prefer it in the evening.

So for Tony O'Neill, moving to a more southerly state (closer to the equator) is the only way to provide a true increase in winter daylight hours, with corresponding earlier winter sunrises and later sunsets than we have in Indiana.

Sincerely, Bill Starr
1421 N 475 E
COLUMBUS IN 47203-9380
Bartholomew County resident
http://tinyurl.com/88nnw
Tue, 29 Nov 2005

cc: letter to the editor, Indiana legislators, Governor Daniels

Ref: http://dms.dot.gov/search/document.cfm?documentid=374636&docketid=22114
Ref: http://dms.dot.gov/search/document.cfm?documentid=375009&docketid=22114