Home Indiana Time Debate 1: Daylight Saving Debate 2: Eastern vs Central Indianapolis South Bend Other Areas > Non-Commerce Solar Time Natural Time More Info History Videos | Other Areas of Indiana | |||||
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The decision to place a county in a time zone is up to the Secretary of Transportation. All decisions are made "for the convenience of commerce". (Please see Eastern vs Central for an overview of the Eastern vs Central debate.) Nearly all of Indiana is connected to Indianapolis - the center of the state and state capitol. Of the 92 counties in Indiana, 80 follow Eastern Time. As long as Indianapolis remains in Eastern Time there is no compelling reason for most counties to change. (Historically, all except two counties that have left Eastern Time for Central Time have returned to Eastern Time.) | ||||||
The Evansville area is the area where the most changes in time zones have occurred. The diagram to the right shows the Evansville Basic Economic Area. As part of the 2006 time zone change the entire BEA was placed in Central Time (moving six counties from Eastern Time). 18 months later five of those counties moved back to Eastern Time. While there is a potential for further change, the counties have demonstrated that they have stronger economic ties to Indianapolis than Evansville. The Louisville and Cincinnati areas have strong ties to the Eastern Time zone. If Indianapolis should ever change to Central Time it is expected that the border counties would remain in Eastern Time. (The five counties closest to Louisville and Cincinnati were specifically set to remain in Eastern Time by the State of Indiana.) The additional counties in the Louisville and Cincinnati BEAs would need to choose whether their ties were closer to Indianapolis or to their own BEA. The Fort Wayne area has historically followed Indianapolis when it came to time zone. Prior to observing Daylight Saving Time in 2006 both Indianapolis and Fort Wayne TV markets ran their stations on a one hour delay during Daylight Time, tape delaying programming so that would air on the same time on the clock despite being an hour later than the Eastern Time airings. Of all the areas in Indiana only the South Bend area would be likely to change time zones without the Indianapolis area changing time zones. Any change without Indianapolis would not meet the "for the convenience of commerce" requirement. With no reason to break away from Indianapolis the status quo should be followed. Eastern Time for Indiana. |