>Please don't advertise that the UK is really really metric - from a
>pro-metric US person's perspective it's misleadingly encouraging - for a
>pro-imperial or pro-choice person it just looks silly.
The UK is *much* more metricated than the US. I sometimes feel that
metrication is still not complete enough here in Ireland, but it is only
when I go to the US that I realize how far we have come.
The US is overwhelmingly non-metric. Everywhere you go, most road
signs, signs in stores, legal notices, TV advertisements are only
in Colonial units.
In comparison, the UK is well metricated. The biggest visible imperial
area is of course road signs. But go into any shop and you will see
products labelled in metric. You can go to a deli counter, and ask for
300 g of product, and they will weigh it out for you on metric scales,
as opposed to looking at you as if you had two heads.
I occasionally visit theme parks with my children, mainly in Florida,
California and the UK. In the UK, *ALL* the height restrictions on the rides
are posted in metric only. In the US, they are quoted in inches (not feet and
inches for some reason).
Even travelling on the roads, if you pull in for petrol [gasoline] you
buy it by the liter, and price is displayed *only* in pence per liter
(no sign of the gallon). On television (we get the British channels
over here) you hear both imperial and metric units tossed around.
Metric tends to be used when people want to be precise about a measurement
("the knife had a 15 cm blade") and imperial when it's simply a phrase
("the incident took place just yards from the police station").
The only time I asked for directions to a station in London (being male,
I don't often do this), I was told it was "100 metres up the road on
the right". Perhaps that was not typical, but I doubt if I would have
got such a response in the US unless the person I asked was wearing
(a) a uniform & helmet, and sitting on a humvee
or
(b) a white lab coat.
If you were an Australian visiting the UK, it would appear to you that
you were in a very non-metric country. For an American, it would probably
appear to be very metric. It is a comparative impression; we mainly
notice the differences.
Don't be hard on your compatriots - you're getting there :-)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Tom Wade | EMail: tee dot wade at eurokom dot ie
EuroKom | Tel: +353 (1) 296-9696
A2, Nutgrove Office Park | Fax: +353 (1) 296-9697
Rathfarnham | Disclaimer: This is not a disclaimer
Dublin 14 | Tip: "Friends don't let friends do Unix !"
Ireland
