Dear Eva!
I read on Facebook that you consider the winter time change to be “completely stupid”. I understand that, it’s pretty clear from a Viennese perspective. Unfortunately (as always) there is not only the personal frog’s eye view, but also a larger one. Here we are:
The Central European time zone extends from the eastern border of Slovakia to the western border of Spain. That means we have the same time from the border with Ukraine to the Atlantic. I ask you to work out what that means for the position of the sun. While a family is having dinner in Košice, a family in La Coruña could almost still have breakfast! Calculate the different sunrises and sunsets: For example, today the sun sets at 4:10 p.m. in Košice and at 6:20 p.m. in La Coruña. That is more than 2 hours (!) which decide between lightness and darkness.
The geographical solution to make a clock change unnecessary would be very simple: You would have to draw the border to Western European Time between Germany-Switzerland-Italy and BeNeLux-France. However, this is impossible because these are precisely the most densely connected areas in the world. In Amsterdam-Luxembourg-Strasbourg-Nice it would then be an hour later than in Hamburg-Cologne-Basel-Genoa. That is completely unthinkable for all the people who live there.
These problems of “time” can be found in many “places” in the world. The geographically true solution would be to drag the Zero-Merdian not through London-Greenwich, but through Rome. That would solve quite a few problems worldwide, but not necessarily the problem of borders in Europe. We will therefore have to wait a little longer for the political solution. In the meantime we have to live with the fact that my friend Eva is angry and that the protest parties accuse “Europe” of failure.
In the medium term we have two solutions: Either we destroy everything and then rebuild it, or we live with the imperfections of this world and accept a few disadvantages in order to be able to live here on this planet. I’m afraid humanity is just opting for the first solution.
So much from the eagle’s perspective. I wish you a good morning!
Peter
—
Vienna Calling 