“Sunshine Protection Act” potential affect on operating hours, EMH, nighttime events, etc.

[Gitson Shiggles]

Pending approval of the FL Governor and exemption by Congress, Daylight Savings Time will be year-round in Florida effective this year. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/state/florida/article203781769.html

If this goes through (I can’t see why not), what is the potential impact on park operating hours, etc?

 

[MisterPenguin]

The Federal law allows states to opt out of DST, it doesn't allow a state to chose to remain in perpetual DST.

I highly doubt Congress would amend the law to allow this.

But, if it does: Orlando currently has the following day light hours and sunrise/set:

• Summer Solstice: 14 hours, 6:30 AM - 8:30 PM EDT
• Spring/Fall Equninox: 12 hours, 7:30 AM - 7:30 PM EDT
• Winter Solstice: 10:20 hours, 7:15 AM - 5:35 PM EST

If it goes to permanent DST, then the hours would be...

• Summer Solstice: 14 hours, 6:30 AM - 8:30 PM EDT
• Spring/Fall Equninox: 12 hours, 7:30 AM - 7:30 PM EDT
• Winter Solstice: 10:20 hours, 8:15 AM - 6:35 PM EDT

 

[Bullseye1967]

Congress will not pass this, this is more a publicity stunt than anything. 6 states have tried this in the past in one way or another and all been shot down.

 

[mergatroid]

Pending approval of the FL Governor and exemption by Congress, Daylight Savings Time will be year-round in Florida effective this year. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/state/florida/article203781769.html

If this goes through (I can’t see why not), what is the potential impact on park operating hours, etc?

I can't see it having too much affect on the park hours to be honest. Perhaps for lighting reasons the fireworks and Fantasmic may have to start at a different time if this came to pass?

 

[J_Krafty24]

I would love that!

 

[Monty]

I guess the "impact" would be Rope Drop in the dark on EMH mornings. Other than that, Fireworks might start a little later in winter months to avoid twilight.

 

[righttrack]

The biggest impacts are on technology. Those of us who are technologists just wish that there is a national decision on this and it stays. Do it or not, but do it once and do it for the whole country. It costs a lot of money to make these changes because timezones are baked into computer operating systems and even the hardware itself and means massive change.

As for WDW, they just adjust park hours to take advantage of the changing time over the year. A few dark mornings aren't that big of a deal, there already are some dark mornings to deal with and this might just mean a few more.

 

[OneofThree]

It's absurd. DST needs to be repealed entirely -it has outlived any usefulness and contributes to all sorts of problems. To stay on DST in Florida? No thanks. Not a big fan of 8:00A.M. sunrise times.

 

[LAKid53]

I imagine Gov. Scott's office is getting inundated with phone calls from irate parents demanding he veto the bill. No parent wants their child standing at the bus stop in the dark or the sun setting at 8:30 pm. DST needs to be repealed, period. As the Earth moves around the Sun in its annual orbit, the period of sunlight gets longer during the warmer months. DST wasn't one of Ben Franklin's better ideas.

We're not an agrarian society any more. Sadly, one can count on the Florida Legislature ignoring real needs in the State and passing nonsense legislation like this.

 

[BoarderPhreak]

DST just needs to go. There's no current gas shortage, we don't use coal to heat our homes (directly) nor are we at war and most of it is surrounded by myths and is just a shame.

 

[OneofThree]

Anyone who thinks early sunsets are a good thing are out of their damn mind.

Right, because a 9:00p.m. twilight does wonders for the circadian rhythm.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

I could care less what that. I just despise the sun setting at 5 freaking 30. I’m an outdoors guy and later sunsets give me the chance to enjoy that. There’s frankly no good arguements against why we should do away with DST

You're arguing against yourself. If you don't like 5:30 sunsets, you should want permanent daylight savings time, not the elimination of daylight savings time. If we were in daylight savings time in the winter, those 5:30 sunsets would be 6:30 sunsets.

 

[OneofThree]

I could care less what that. I just despise the sun setting at 5 freaking 30. I’m an outdoors guy and later sunsets give me the chance to enjoy that. There’s frankly no good arguements against why we should do away with DST

So if I understand your first two post here, you claim that there aren't any good reasons to do away with DST, primarily it happens to suit you personally. Just because you "could care less", doesn't mean there aren't very good reasons to discontinue DST. In fact, it's just not healthy for the population and there's quite a bit of supporting research.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

So if I understand your first two post here, you claim that there aren't any good reasons to do away with DST.

No, he has a double negative in there. He's saying there aren't any good reasons against doing away with DST.

But then he seems to argue the opposite, so I don't know.

 

[OneofThree]

No, he has a double negative in there. He's saying there aren't any good reasons against doing away with DST.

But then he seems to argue the opposite, so I don't know.

You need to defer to me on this one. While I admittedly do not speak the dialect, 10+ years of living where I do have afforded me the ability of understanding it.

 

[KBLovedDisney]

I really hope having a permanent DST won't effect my cats. They already sing the song of their people at 3am. If they start that stuff at 2...oh boy.

 

[bhg469]

As someone who lives in the northeast, I would love for there do be more light in the evening. It gets brutally depressing when the entire day of daylight has come and gone while you're working. At least in the south, the temps are still nice enough to go do something outside.

 

[NelleBelle]

As someone who lives in the northeast, I would love for there do be more light in the evening. It gets brutally depressing when the entire day of daylight has come and gone while you're working. At least in the south, the temps are still nice enough to go do something outside.

Agree! I'm in the Pacific Northwest and seeing sunlight (actual sun) 3-4 months out of the year stinks!! I like daylight savings only because we get longer days to actually take advantage of what little sunlight we do get up here! I love having sunset close to 10pm in the summer and would love not having sunset at 4 in the winter. It's no wonder everyone is vitamin D deficient up here!!

 

[KBLovedDisney]

At least in the south, the temps are still nice enough to go do something outside.

Ha! Heater in the morning, air conditioning in the afternoon, heater again at night. Sometimes the days are opposite. We have gone from 76 degrees to 29 in the past two days. Are you guys up north getting winter and spring in the same week?

It is seriously a guessing game when it comes to temps especially. Oh look honey! It looks so nice outside!

It's a trap.

 

[NelleBelle]

We're getting low 30's and scraping windshields in the morning to mid-upper 50s in the afternoon. Typical Seattle spring weather (although last week they were calling for low-land snow )