For decades, a foot in one US state could be a different length in another – but now the government is putting an end to the measuring mess. The news prompted jokes that America...gasp... could go metric.
The international foot was introduced in America in 1959, but – for some reason – the land surveyors were allowed to temporarily keep the old US survey foot; and six decades later it’s still used in some 40 states.
The survey foot equals 0.3048006 meters, while the international foot is shorter by three digits and therefore simpler – 0.3048 meters. While the difference between the two 12-inch measurements is miniscule and can’t be seen with the naked eye, it makes a difference on big distances and sometimes creates big problems.
“We have chaos,” Michael Dennis from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration told AP. The simultaneous use of the international and survey foot, among other things, caused complications in planning for high speed rail in California, while also disrupting bridge construction between Oregon and Washington as the two states rely on different measurements.
It’s embarrassing that we even had this going on for 60 years. This whole thing is ridiculous.
The decision to finally give up on the survey foot was made by the federal government in October, but it only became a hot topic online now after AP wrote a piece about it. The commentators agreed that it was high time to make the move.
However, some jokingly urged America to use its military might and political weight to protect the patriotic US survey foot from an attack by the globalists.
Many also believed that the US should go even further and not just abandon the survey foot, but change its whole measurement system in line with the rest of the world – from feet and pounds to meters and kilograms.
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