The editor remembers this slogan from his time in the UK construction industry in the early 1970’s. Almost half a century later, Ronnie Cohen gives real-world examples of metric quantities that may help those who are not as familiar with metric units as they might wish.
Author: Ronnie Cohen
London speed limits make front page news
Ronnie Cohen, one of our regular contributors, wonders why it will be easy to find the cash to reduce speed limits in London but has been impossible to convert them to metric.
Isolationist or Imperialist?
On the eve of a showdown Cabinet meeting on Brexit, one of our frequent contributors, Ronnie Cohen, asks if British attitudes both to the EU and to this country’s metric changeover are part of the same mindset.
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Road traffic signs mark a soft border
The Irish Border has appeared frequently in the news as a major obstacle to a withdrawal agreement between the UK and the remaining 27 EU member states. In this article, Ronnie Cohen looks at a ‘soft’ characteristic of the current border – the change of measurement units on road traffic signs.
Deficits, the global measurement system and global trade
In this article, Ronnie Cohen looks at the deficits of some major economies and asks if apparent reluctance to use the global measurement system is a symptom of a wider problem – adapting to a changed world.
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The DfT’s duplicated reports
When Ronnie Cohen was researching the use of miles and kilometres for other articles, he came across several instances of metric and imperial versions of the same report produced by the DfT. In this article he gives details.
Diaries, and a glimpse into the past
Many of us have probably bought a diary for 2018 recently. Ronnie Cohen takes a look at the conversion tables found at the front of many sold in the UK.
Lack of co-ordination between DfT publications
This week, Ronnie Cohen looks at a problem faced by the UK Department of Transport (DfT) resulting from the our two-system measurement muddle. With continuing staffing cuts in Civil Service and the diversion of effort to deal with Brexit, it would appear that such problems are unlikely to be resolved in the foreseeable future.
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Use of the kilometre in the UK
As noted in a comment on our last article, the BBC’s acclaimed new series Blue Planet 2 uses metric measures for smaller distances and depths but miles for greater ones. Ronnie Cohen takes this opportunity to look at instances when kilometres are preferred to miles.
DfT myths and reality
Over the years, the UK Department for Transport (DfT) has come up with many arguments in support of successive Transport Ministers’ reluctance to convert UK road traffic signs from an outdated and poorly understood system of measurement to one that is simple, logical and almost universal. Ronnie Cohen puts forward counter arguments.
