AM/PM MT: Our time zone is a thing of beauty

Published 3:45 pm Friday, March 6, 2026

You thought the Culture Wars were bad? Wait until we experience the Time Wars. They’re just around the corner. Will we be going to war with our neighbours to the east and west over time? Over an hour?

I knew it all along — it will be the clock that tears us apart. It’s already happening.

Last week, B.C. announced a permanent shift to Daylight Savings Time. March 8 will have been the last time B.C. clocks will ever jump an hour ahead. Wait, not everybody in B.C. — the East Kootenay will stay aligned with Alberta in the Mountain time zone, and we will switch our clocks forth and back, spring and fall.

This has produced no small amount of discussion, not to mention rancour. For one thing, why is B.C. choosing to freeze the clocks in Daylight Savings Time, and not Standard Time?

And for another thing — once again, it is the clock, our tyrant master, that is dictating how we live, and the decisions we make.

Used to be that we lived according to the sweeping rhythms of the seasons, of the sun and the moon. But ever since we invented money, we’ve had to live according to the precise, artificial, arbitrary, mechanical increments of the clock. No other machine has informed our lives so completely. The clock is so inexorable it makes AI look like a dithering Hamlet, the confused Prince of Denmark.

But something in our DNA yearns to follow the sun, to set our lives according to the seasons. And so we created this Spring Forward-Fall Back dichotomy, to give ourselves the impression that in spite of our clock-inhibited movements and actions, we are still all early-to-bed-early-to-rise, up with the chickens, healthy, wealthy, and wise, Mr. and Ms. Natural.

But it proved to be unsustainable, that Spring Forward-Fall Back. And so, B.C.has surrendered, like Creston, the Yukon, Saskatchewan, et al, and is freezing the triumphant clock in place. Except for us here in the East Kootenay. Where before, every fall, we would only fall back into the arms of Creston, now we are falling back into the arms of the entire Pacific Time zone.

In fairness, they aren’t bad things, these time zones — Canada’s six and the world’s 24. In some ways, they are things of beauty, adding longitudinal individuality and personality to the world.

It is understood that some folks in the region want to join the Pacific Time Zone. I say NO!

This is the Mountain Time Zone, and here in the East Kootenay we are Mountain people, not Ocean people. And of all the time zones, the Mountain Time Zone is the best. I challenge anyone to name a better one.

Placed as we are between the Pacific and Eastern time zones, we have excellent morning relations with the East of the continent, and even Europe, as well as wonderful afternoon relations with the West coast and even Asia. We are close cousins with the Central Time Zone. We have more light at the end of our work day.

What geography we enjoy in the Mountain Time Zone, from the deserts of the south to our mysterious northern mountain peaks.

In short, the Mountain Time Zone is the best of both worlds. It means a slower, more relaxed pace of life, with better air, closer to the sky, yet plugged right in the engine of the wider world.

On the other hand, time is important. And we are British Columbians here in the East Kootenay, proud and true. We are not Albertans, with their desire to have their own unique time zone.

So the obvious solution, as always, is to compromise. We keep the best of the Mountain time zone, as Mountain people, but as British Columbians, we adapt and adopt. This will entail, like the rest of B.C., getting rid of the Spring Forward in March. So we will never advance our clocks one hour again.

However, as part of the Mountain Time zone, like Alberta, we will continue to fall back, and set our clocks back one hour every fall.

This strategy, which I’m confident that not only Cranbrook, but the entire region will enthusiastically support, will make us true British Columbian AND proud Mountain Time Zonians. And it will go a long way to averting the terrible Time Wars.

Not to mention, adding days to our lifespans — one day every 24 years, in fact.

And, happy Daylight Savings Time, everybody, whether you’re Pacific or Mountain.