Submitted by Anything-Complex t3_126700m in Washington
Would you support a full conversion to SI units in Washington? Efforts to fully metricate on the federal level seem dead, but states could drive the change by converting individually. The changeover in Washington could occur fairly rapidly, with road and highway signs changed to km/h, gasoline sold in liters, and temperatures represented in °C within the span of a year.
If the surrounding states also convert, it doesn’t really matter. Washington is isolated from the eastern U.S. and shouldn’t be beholden to their inability to progress.
Thinking like this is why we can’t get along as a whole. Good intentions aren’t always good ideas. Putting the cart before the horse is just stupid.
But we’re not isolated, are we? Today alone I saw four Florida plates and a Georgia plate. You’re asking an entire state, a good chunk of which are (and will continue to be) transplants, to convert to metric while the rest of the country doesn’t. That’s a whole lot of work for no good reason imo
Lol you don't know much about Washington. The country's biggest retailer (Amazon) is headquartered here. Our agricultural products are shipped all over the country. We supply most of the country's hops for beer. We supply most of the country's passenger jets from Boeing. We run everyone's computers with Microsoft products. I could go on and on. We gained a million new residents since the last census!! The rest of the country is pretty much aware of us.
What would the cost to replace all the signs be, and what would be accomplished by doing this?
Would you do it all at once, or in increments, such as changing speed limit signs first? Or the temperature?
Would there be a way to retrofit older cars with KPH more prominently displayed?
Sure, but why not just put both? (Unless that is how switching happens).
Dealing in metric feels a lot like eating vegetables I hate. I know I should, I know it's good for me in the long run, but I sure don't like doing it.
I tell you what, I surely don't want to cook by measuring out ingredients with a scale in grams vs teaspoons and cups. What a pain in the ass that would be.
One is volume, one is weight. Not the same. Keeping using your teaspoon- it’s just a 5ml spoon now. And a tablespoon is just 15ml
I have only seen cookbooks using grams so thats why I mentioned it. So new metric measurements would also require me to buy all that stuff again.
My wife is a cook - she says recipes using weights are more consistent than volume no matter your units preference but I think you are missing a connection... if you are using weights (grams) you need a scale... period - none of those books will tell you a universal gram to teaspoon conversion and there is not metric equivalent to a teaspoon... but if you do find yourself with a cookbook mentioning weight/grams just plop it in a container on your scale (hell that container can be a half cup measuring cup) and move along.
Agreed. I dont have a scale either though.
Omg stop. We can’t just fuck off so hard in left field like that and not appear pretentious as hell.
I use metric a LOT and "rapidly" is the wrong approach, IMO. The change in signage isn't the hurdle, it's the mental shift in getting folks to understand the new units, rather than getting resistance of how they can't kilometers.
A law on the order of "Every [sign/marking] which includes Imperial must (upon its next replacement/update) include SI units of measurement, either in-addition-to or in-place-of, the Imperial units" would facilitate a gradual introduction, making SI prominent as signage naturally needs updating. And then let time take its course. We'll probably end up in a UK/Canada hybrid-units situation (minus body-weight in stone) but it's still progress.
And its way bigger than just kilometers. Think of lumber for example. Every sawmill has to be retooled to cut in meters and centimeters instead of feet and inches. Everything that is used to measure, everything we build from wood would change in size which may or may not fit where it is needing to be built. This one industry alone would see huge costs which would be passed down to the consumer.
> Every sawmill has to be retooled to cut in meters and centimeters instead of feet and inches.
I disagree that this is a concern in the short term. My initial push is not to legislate product offerings, but rather to push signage and mental shifts and making SI units ubiquitous. "You're refreshing this sign anyway, it now needs to include a little more info" is a pretty small cost burden spread over time.
Each industry will face challenges in metricification. You might never get the lumber industry to convert the product line: "lumber is Imperial because blueprints are Imperial because lumber is Imperial." I don't have a solution here, but retooling the mill is not where we need to begin. If a major home builder said "we're tired of doing blueprints in the US in Imperial, who wants to retool with us?" you'll get the demand. And if it doesn't happen, so be it. I don't want anyone to stop making / selling / speaking of 'a 2x4'. I just want Home Depot's sign to say 2"x4"x8' / 48mm x 98mm x 2.4m.
Bogging down in the late stage of "how each industry converts to metric" hides the issue that blocks getting started: as a country, we don't know how to think in metric, because we don't see it every day. Signs help begin to change that.
Here's my dream: someone visiting the US who doesn't know Imperial can see directions using km, to get to a grocery store where they can buy meat and produce and know the price per kg.
A visitor is not going to be buying meat at a grocery store, they are going to be eating out. And if they for some reason were buying groceries they are going to be more concerned about the currency conversion than the unit of measure. Come on. I mean what benefit is there really?
> A visitor is not going to be buying meat at a grocery store, they are going to be eating out.
Having done longer stays, gonna disagree with that. Grocery shopping in other countries is great for saving money and getting to experience the place.
> And if they for some reason were buying groceries they are going to be more concerned about the currency conversion than the unit of measure. Come on. I mean what benefit is there really?
Low-level: Gas in Denmark right now is 14.66 DKK per Liter. "What's that in FreedomBuxx?" You usually have the currency conversion squirreled away in your head when you're in a country for a while. If you can think in Liters, you can do "1 USD is a little under 7 DKK so it's a smidge over $2 and change for a liter" and you're done. If you can only think in gallons, you do that, and then also have to convert 3.78541 liters per gallon, which yeah, you can round to 4, but it's another conversion. And while you might have "a liter is a quart, for small use cases", it's a second conversion and this pretty much where brains blow up. (Answer: it's 8.12 USD/gal).
High-level: We're on an island of Imperial units, and that's isolating to commerce/tourism. It's fine that we're 'the exception' while we're the 800lb-gorilla (363kg) economy but, someday we may not be. We doggedly refuse to believe that there could be any long-term (generations-length) benefit to the local+world economy that could outweigh the (amortized over generations) costs... to the point that the idea of starting a systemic/slow conversion seems too much, because we can't see what's on the other side.
I get you're not convinced. I'm sorry.
No I'm not. I'm not seeing any benefit but a whole lot of cost. We are doing just fine with imports/exports and tourism.
That could work, if it is actually followed through. The reason I suggest a fast conversion is to force people to adapt to the change without conversion efforts being stymied by resistance.
No, because it is expensive and unless the rest of the US joins in it is moot. I doubt the NHTSA is chill with sudden jumps between units between states.
Also most all kids learn both, everyone in the sciences is trained in metric already. It needs to be nationwide or not at all
FWIW, I-19 (Tucson AZ to the Mexican border) is signed in meters. Not a shining example of federal policy / decisionmaking since it's all intra-Arizona, but, "woo, there's one!"
I’m put off by the term “metrication”.
No
I just touch the little microphone picture on my phone & ask for the conversions.
As long as I can still measure the trunk space of a car by how many bodies I think would fit into it then we're good.
It's the way the world is going. Why? Because it is the only thing that makes sense.
World already went there.
Not all of it
Only Myanmar and Liberia besides the US. So yeah, pretty much all of it.
If you take the percentage of space these three countries represent and remove it from a soccer ball you can't play the game very well. But to be accurate, the U S is and has been using the metric system in industry, all branches of the military, and science, etc. for many a year.
Exactly
NO.
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Sure. I was taught it in elementary school and it always made more sense. I still have the conversion factors memorized.
But I won't hold my breath on the timeline. Elementary school was 50 years ago and nothing has happened yet.
If we can ever make Cascadia a (political) reality, I’d be all for it.
Until then, I don’t think Congress would go for it, and the Constitution explicitly gives them jurisdiction over anything involving interstate commerce.
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The knee jerk - anti change response is strong!
I completely support this but I’m a scientist so already biased here. The only time I really have troubles shifting is temperature… I just like the finer scale of Fahrenheit for the range of human experience.
But in all this pushback what really amazes me is some of the following just seem to be ignored: Doesn’t seem to matter that we already have Km/hr and mph on our cars (just flip the emphasized unit). Or that anyone crossing the Canadian or Mexico border has to “make these conversions” Any mechanic worth their weight has a complete metric set as well as imperial. We buy liquids in liters (coke) a lot! The world has to make special tools for American products (or they don’t and we suck it up… eg cars) and Americans already make/use a lot of shit in metric (computer chips use nanometer as a scale) Also It’s just a name -switching to metric doesn’t mean the existing product has to be replaced. Your 200gal propane tank can still be filled with a metric volume of Propane
Will it require money to change signs - yes. Will a public awareness campaign be needed. Yes. Do I hear a lot of whining about “change sucks and any change is bad” - yes
I feel like it would be hard to do unless the whole country does it. If the rest of the country still uses the imperial units, the state will still need to deal with that.
I use both systems daily so I wouldn’t mind
No. Im not doing anything that will require even the slightest bit of effort. Even writing this post was a bit of a drag...
The problem is the cost of every factory (in the u.s.) having to retool to different measurements. Every gas pump would have to be recalibrated to liters. Car odometers and speedometers would be useless and have to be replaced. Every mile marker and mileage sign and speed limit sign would have to be replaced.. on and on and on. And this cost will flow down to the consumer. Things are expensive enough already.
I am capable of converting. But I won’t. No.
I am in favor of the metric system and use it often. What I see happening during any types of conversion is that we lose something in the conversion. Same price / lower amount, however, you don't see it easily without a calculator. Examples:
We keep our rooms at 20°C, this is 68°F, a little cool for me.
2 dollars per liter, this is $8/ gallon ( rounded)
2 kilos would be sold in place of 5 pounds loosing (600 grams or 1.3 pounds)
Speed Limit 110 km/hr is 68 MPH (rounded)
We should do this and be educated so that we know what we are getting.
MagicWalrusO_o t1_je7ytdl wrote
Benefits aren't worth having to convert everytime you deal with the rest of the country