I am a newcomer to this mailing list and stumbled upon it by a series of unlikely events. I would certainly prefer to use a newsgroup for this topic. Does anybody have the knowhow to set one up?
Forgive me if I am mentioning something that has been mentioned before but I have the following question: Is it possible to increase the United States use of yards rather than feet? This will simplify the eventual transition to meters. Familiarity with distances in yards is useful when encountering distances in meters (either for an eventual transition of the US, or simply for the convenience of Americans when travelling to the rest of the world). The UK has made an unpublicised, quiet, gradual conversion over many years. They reduced the use of feet and increased the use of yards in road signs and elsewhere. It is much easier for organisations and the public to convert from yards to meters than from feet to meters. The Brits have been in transition for more than 30 years using ideas like this but still have a long way to go. As far as I understand it, they concentrated on introducing yards for reasonably long horizontal distances with integer values. Feet are still used for vertical distances(aviation, bridge heights, body heights). A sign saying 'Rail crossing 150 yds' will eventually be converted to 'Rail crossing 150 metres'. The latter sign being relocated of course. It is impossible to convert imperial to metric without encountering the 'round number' problem but this is a problem independent of the yards/feet question. In any measurement system, signs are placed partly due to an approximation of the safety-optimum location but also in order to display a round number. The use of yards rather than feet does not present legal challenges and is not controversial. Organisations not brave enough to address metrication per se may be persuaded to increase the use of yards particularly for distances . I hope this doesn't sound like an outrageous idea. Where can we use yards rather than feet? Should it be for integer horizontal distances greater than x feet (for a debatable value of x). __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Try FREE Yahoo! Mail - the world's greatest free email! http://mail.yahoo.com/
