Staying on mountain daylight time, also known as Pacific standard time, will cripple winter outdoor recreation and tourism and prevent the province from ever achieving the ambitious $25-billion goal for tourism in Alberta. Permanent daylight saving time will cause more problems than it will fix.
Unlike climate-controlled sports arenas and convention centres, ski resorts can only operate in daylight. With less than eight hours of daylight over Christmas, we are opening in near darkness at 9 a.m. and closing lifts as the sun sets around 4 p.m. We run the same hours as our competitors in Colorado and Utah, who have up to an hour and a half more sunlight due to their latitude.
Some offer special “first tracks” powder tours immediately following avalanche control as early as 7:30 or 8:00 a.m. However, such early-bird opportunities are not possible for us because we cannot open before avalanche control and all operational checks are complete — and avalanche control cannot be done in the dark.
All our major competitors in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah operate on mountain standard time during the ski season. It makes no sense for Calgary and Edmonton to be in a different time zone than Denver and Salt Lake City during the cold, dark days of winter.
We were shocked that there was no consultation with Alberta’s major winter tourism operators and destination ski resorts prior to Premier Danielle Smith’s public announcement. We have written to the premier requesting an urgent meeting to highlight how the proposal to remain on permanent daylight saving time could devastate the ski industry.
We will strongly urge her to include this time-change issue in the upcoming referendum. By doing so, she would be fulfilling the commitment to consultation outlined in the premier’s mandate letter to Tourism Minister Andrew Boitchenko.
Most importantly, she would be respecting democracy by not overruling the 2021 referendum. The time change should be included as a question in the upcoming October referendum, using wording about permanent “standard time” similar to that of the 2021 referendum, when permanent daylight saving time was rejected. The 2021 result should be respected until a new referendum question is asked and decided.
In conclusion, we urge all those affected by this change — from parents with children who will be going to school in the dark, to contractors, to all outdoor recreation operators who rely on natural light — to let the premier know your thoughts and concerns.
Ralph Scurfield is president and CEO of Banff Sunshine Village.
