The United States (US) has endured biannual clock changes for 60 years. A recently passed bill in the US House to make daylight saving time (DST) permanentmay finally end this clock change gymnastics. Canada has also endured their own clock change chaos, dating back to 1908. In general, the further away a location is from the equator, the more pronounced the ebb and flow of daylight changes across the calendar. This is why daylight clock synchronization policies are more critical and challenging in Canada than in the US.
Statistics Canada has estimated that around two-thirds of the Canadian population live within 100 km of the US border. Others have estimated that 90 percent of the Canadian population lives within 160 km of the border. Therefore, the impact of seasonal light on these people is comparable to those living in large US cities like Seattle, Washington, Detroit, Michigan, and Buffalo, New York.
Of the 41+ million living in Canada, around one-half live in the metropolitan areas surrounding Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Calgary, and Edmonton. The impact of clock changes on the first five is comparable to northern US cities, given their proximity to the border. All these cities observe DST.
At present, seven of the 10 provinces toggle between DST and standard time. The exceptions are Saskatchewan, which mostly observes year-round standard time, and British Columbia and Alberta, which mostly observe permanent DST.
The large latitudinal height of the provinces means that sunlight changes are extreme, particularly in June-July and December-January. Of course, the population in extreme northern Canadian communities are also very sparse. For example, one of the larger northern cities, Whitehorse, Yukon, has a population of around 34 thousand people, around one percent of the city of Toronto’s population. Whitehorse does not observe DST, with the longest day in June seeing over 19 hours of daylights, and the shortest day in December seeing less than six hours of daylight. These daylight times are close to those in Anchorage, Alaska, which is not surprising given that they are at similar latitudes.
What all this means is that at the extreme, the further away an area is from the equator, the greater amount of sunlight changes occur, but the less important biannual clock changes become. This is because in the winter months, shifting six hours of daylight by one hour does not change the fact that most of the time is still in the dark.
Yukon and the Northwest Territories are now using permanent DST, which aligns with British Columbia and Alberta. It will not be long before Saskatchewan changes course and moves from permanent standard time to permanent DST. Manitoba may also follow suit. The provinces to the east, which also include the primary population centers of Toronto and Montreal, will be more prone to follow the US lead, whatever that happens to be.
What is certain today is that biannual clock changes are poised to be sunset across the continent at some point over the next few years. Though permanent DST is viewed as unhealthy by sleep researchers, momentum in that direction is likely to continue to grow across Canada. Of course, splitting the difference and settling on 30 minutes between DST and standard time would be a reasonable compromise that has yet to gain traction.
In a society where clock changes are done digitally, sunsetting biannual time change policies make sense. Canada is effecting such change one province at a time, while the US is trying to do it with one fell swoop across the nation. The net effect for both countries will likely be the same.