So we went on a trip to the Renaissance Faire in Tuxedo, NY this fall for reasons that aren’t germane right now.
Here’s what I found most interesting: the parking lot.
We wound up in the “free” parking lot, a goodly walk from the Main Event, as all the others were full. The lot is in a valley, that being the general terrain around those parts.
The first thing that struck me was that the lot was suspiciously level. Walking toward the path over the hill to the Faire showed that the whole thing was paved with crushed blast-furnace slag and sported many, many concrete pads and foundations that were absolutely flat and flush with the gravel. No grass, no curbs, no drains, no nothing.
Somebody spent a lot of money making a parking lot in the middle of nowhere dead flat and perfectly level? WTF?
On our way out, I spotted the reason: it’s an old antenna test range. See the dish at the far end, aimed right down the bore of the valley? No feed structure and it seems to be covered in graffiti, so it’s out of action.
The overview from above shows the straight dope. The Faire is the tangle of junk inside the bow of the road on the left, the antenna range is the long vertical stripe to the upper right.
Zoom in on the valley and examine the patterns!
I took those pictures from the left side of the valley, roughly in line with the lower X, where the paving widens.
I thought it must have something to do with Bell Labs, but apparently it’s even weirder: Tuxedo Park.
Now, there’s a guy with a basement shop it is to die for!
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 