Eastern time or permanent Daylight Savings Time?

[sharky60]

Still a little confused, I've heard both, which is it?

Are we going to "spring ahead" one hour in the spring, or are we just going to stay with the same time we are on now?

 

[cvchief]

As it stands, everything I hear is EST, never EDT.

 

[ggunn]

Still a little confused, I've heard both, which is it?

Are we going to "spring ahead" one hour in the spring, or are we just going to stay with the same time we are on now?

Q. Roo will not "spring forward" but will remain on Eastern Standard Time throughout the year. That means when the US is not on Daylight Savings Time, the time on Cozumel will be that same as the East Coast, and when the US is on DST it will be the same as the time in the Central Time Zone in the US.

 

[Ron Lee]

ggunn is right. If you understand GMT/UT then Cozumel/Q. Roo will always be UT-5 hours (GMT-5). This ignores any minor differences between UT and GMT if they exist.

 

[cvchief]

ggunn is right. If you understand GMT/UT then Cozumel/Q. Roo will always be UT-5 hours (GMT-5). This ignores any minor differences between UT and GMT if they exist.

So we won't need to adjust for leap seconds under UTC?

 

[ggunn]

So we won't need to adjust for leap seconds under UTC?

If we don't, in 10,800 years the time in Cozumel will be off by one hour.

 

[cvchief]

If we don't, in 10,800 years the time in Cozumel will be off by one hour.

One hour farther from central time?

 

[sharky60]

progress...

 

[ggunn]

One hour farther from central time?

No, then it will be the same as Central Standard Time instead of the same as Eastern Standard Time. If you buy your plane tickets now you'll have to take that into account.

 

[mstevens]

If you understand GMT/UT then Cozumel/Q. Roo will always be UT-5 hours (GMT-5)

I agree that this is the correct way to think of it. Universal Time -5 is how it's currently defined. That happens to match up with Eastern Standard Time, but it's also the same as lots of other time zones. Thinking of it as matching EST is correct as far as it goes, but ultimately adds confusion rather than diminishing it.

If Quintana Roo actually wants this to work, they need to pick a name for their new time zone then aggressively publicize it. They need to get every local mobile carrier to use the new time (some people are reporting that their phones still update to UTC-6). They need to get phone and mobile OS manufacturers (Apple and Google, in particular) to include the new timezone on their very next device updates (choosing "Cancun" for a location in iOS used to be the most accurate choice but no longer is). They need to post prominent signs in every appropriate location. Without those efforts, confusion will reign. (More than it does now...)