Incorrect Timezone in formatted output with JDate

Question

I'm able to get the right "time" to display, but I am NOT able to show the correct Timezone in the formatted date that is output to the user.

I've been trying what I can find online and the docs, but can't seem to get that part of the output correct. Am I missing something fundamental, or is this a JDate bug?

My Output

Source Date:  2000-01-01 00:00:00 (stored in DB as UTC)
Expected Output:  1999-12-31 19:00 EST, using format "Y-m-d H:i T"

Joomla Timezone:  DateTimeZone Object
(
    [timezone_type] => 3
    [timezone] => UTC
)

User Timezone:  America/New_York
User DateTimeZone Object
(
    [timezone_type] => 3
    [timezone] => America/New_York
)

1. 2000-01-01 05:00 GMT
2. 2000-01-01 05:00 GMT    

My Code

$thedate = '2000-01-01 00:00:00';
echo '<pre>Source Date:  '.print_r($thedate,true).' (stored in DB as UTC)'."\n";
echo 'Expected Output:  2000-01-01 05:00 EST, using format "Y-m-d H:i T"</pre>';

// Joomla Timezone
$tz_joomla = new DateTimeZone(JFactory::getApplication()->get('offset'));
echo '<pre>Joomla Timezone:  '.print_r($tz_joomla,true).'</pre>';

// User Timezone
$user = JFactory::getUser();
$utzparm = $user->getParam('timezone', 'UTC');
$tz_user = new DateTimeZone($utzparm);
echo '<pre>User Timezone:  '.print_r($utzparm,true)."\n";
echo 'User '.print_r($tz_user,true).'</pre>';

// Output withOUT `->setTimezone`
$date = new JDate($thedate,$tz_user);
$output_date = $date->format('Y-m-d H:i T');
echo '<pre>1. '.print_r($output_date,true).'</pre>';

// Output WITH `->setTimezone`
$date = new JDate($thedate,$tz_user);
$date->setTimezone($tz_user);
$output_date = $date->format('Y-m-d H:i T');
echo '<pre>2. '.print_r($output_date,true).'</pre>';

Answer 1

The answer apparently lies in using ->calendar() instead of ->format() because that method has a second parameter to format locally. The below code gives me the timezone correctly in the output:

$date = new JDate($thedate);
$date->setTimezone($tz_user);
$output_date = $date->calendar('Y-m-d H:i T', true );
echo $output_date';

> 1999-12-31 19:00 EST