So you’re on vacation, cruising down the highway at 70 mph, and this sign flashes past your eyes:
Quick, can you do the conversion from kilometers to miles in your head?
This sign is on a road in Arizona that does go to the U.S.-Mexican border, but it’s on the U.S. side. While helpful to tourists from most of the rest of the world, it leaves the majority of Americans scratching their heads and distracted from operating their vehicle.
Until the Metric System becomes the official U.S. standard of measurement, shouldn’t our highway signs be bi-lingual?
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I’ve always had a weird take on metric/imperial/US controversy. It’s much ado about nothing.
When someone complains about metric I’ll ask them how far a distant object is ( a fur piece, as we saying Kansas), and they’ll give the answer in feet or yards. So I’ll ask to reckon in meters. Either way they’re about as far off the mark. It’s a urinal flush and no one pays attention if it is one gallon or 3.8 liters. How much does a particular model of car weigh in pounds? In kilos?
Weights and measures is really little more than bookkeeping, and as long as you consistently use the same system you won’t make egregious errors–even if you have no concept of what it really means. Take your bank account. You may have a firm grasp that a dollar is a piece of bubblegum or 30seconds at the video arcade, but the $47,692.37? Will it buy you a new car or just an old beater by time you get to the dealer? And what’s that worth in Yen, Rubles, or Krona?
Back to your sign…that isn’t distance; it’s time. 200km at 100kph listening to your favorite music isn’t nearly as long as 27 km at 150 kph with your mother in law screeching in your ear.
LOL – In Southern California, we do measure distance in time – on the freeways, we have electric signs that tell us the estimated time to get from the spot you’re stuck in traffic to the next freeway interchange or Downtown L.A.
I just found it terribly ironic that Arizona, which has been controlled by right-wingers for some time now, would have a road sign in only kilometers.
Looks like the math minutemen are losing the metric migration battle in AZ.
I live about 30 miles south of Wichita. It takes 55 minutes to get there. Doesn’t matter if you’re talking the SW corner or NE corner. By time all routes, interchanges, stoplights, and traffic are accounted for it amounts to only a minute or two difference.
Should add some to the confusion now that exits on interstates are numbered by the closest mile marker and not by the number of exits to the state line (or end of the interstate).
A km is approx 6/10 of a mile. 😉 I’d view the sign as telling me that Amado is a few minutes away, while it’ll take quite a bit longer to get to Tuscon.
Considering how Arizona has slashed its education budget again and again, I doubt most “Grand Canyon State” students could figure out how to convert kilometers into miles.
A lot of kids can’t even read a map. Lack of general knowledge of the world around them, even among college students is appalling. In the video below, Jay Leno quizzes some high school and college students on general geography knowledge. This is painful.
We’re Mericans. We’ll find it when we invade.