Norwegian island where the sun doesn’t set in summer or rise in winter bids to become the world’s first ‘time-free’ zone
- Sommaroy, an island in northern Norway, wants to do away with concept of time
- Around 300 islanders signed petition to become the world’s first time-free zone
- They say time is not relevant to them because sun doesn’t rise for three months in winter, and doesn’t set for 69 days during the summer
- Organisers want to be free of traditional working and trading hours so they can ‘do what we want, when we want’
A Norwegian island where the sun doesn’t rise in winter or set in summer wants to do away with the concept of time.
Around 300 people who live on the island of Sommaroy, in northern Norway, have launched a campaign to become the world’s first time-free zone because they say the concept is not relevant to them.
Kjell Ove Hveding, who is leading the Time-Free Zone campaign, said the aim is to free islanders from traditional working hours and shop trading times, allowing them to do ‘what we want, when we want.’
Around 300 people who live on the Norwegian island of Sommaroy, inside the Arctic Circle, have signed a petition asking to do away with the concept of time (file image)
Hveding says the move makes sense because Sommaroy – located north of the Arctic Circle – does not experience time like much of the rest of the world.
That is because, from November to January, the sun doesn’t rise at all, and from May 18 to July 26, it never goes down.
Living in either perpetual night or eternal sunshine means that traditional notions of night and day quickly lose their meaning.
Speaking to Norwegian public broadcaster NRK, he said: ‘All over the world, people are characterised by stress and depression.
‘In many cases this can be linked to the feeling of being trapped, and here the clock plays a role. We will be a time-free zone where everyone can live their lives to the fullest.
‘Children and young people still have to go to school, but there is room for flexibility. One does not need to be put into a box in the form of school or working hours.
Campaigners on the island want to scrap regular trading hours and working times, saying the restrictions make no sense in a place where the sun doesn’t rise in winter or set in summer
‘Our goal is to provide full flexibility, 24/7. If you want to cut the lawn at 4am, then you do it.’
Hveding launched his campaign in late May following a town hall meeting at which most of the island’s 300 residents voted to go ahead with the idea.
While the idea may have started as a gimmick, after it received worldwide attention Hveding has handed a petition to local MP Kent Gudmundsen in an attempt to push it forward.
He also claims to have received support from the towns of Finnmark and Nordland – located even further north – who are keen to join in with the scheme.
It also comes after the European Union announced that it would scrap daylight savings time from 2021.
That would mean that the twice-annual switching of clocks – adopted after the First World War to reduce fuel consumption – would be no more.