Another quick quiz, but this time with high-resolution imagery (courtesy of Google Earth). I don't know how good you guys are or how obvious these are, so I never know how many and what kinds of hints to give you. I'll just say this about the image (of a city in the United States):There's something interesting regarding the transportation in this image. What is it? Where is it?
13 comments:
Adam already got it; he's not posting his answer to give y'all a chance to guess as well.
The "interesting thing" you see will lead you to think of a financial and political mess in this city over the past 20 years.
My first thought was SF but the orientation of the airport was wrong. My second guess was correct. Do you want me to let the cat out of the bag?
For those of you that care, here is a hint. Toll road to nowhere is I-90.
Sure, bring it out! I thought it was I-93, but I didn't look that closely at road names / numbers.
It's Beantown.
Boston it is. Good work Adam and Jason. The interesting thing is the highway (you can see the toll booths) that disappears under the airport. And under the Boston Harbor. This is part of the "Big Dig" that Boston did for the last 20 years. Billions over budget, fraud from construction companies, leaks in the tunnel under the harbor, falling panels from the tunnel that killed someone, debate whether it really helped traffic (helped with downtown but just pushed the congestion towards the suburbs, not really helping many commuters after all).
I feel like Ruff Ruffman and you guys are my fetchers. Glad there are spatially-minded fellas out there! -Jess
This one was driving me nuts!! I couldn't figure it out for the life of me. My first instinct was Baltimore, then I thought Detroit and SF. I didn't realize that was the airport. I noticed the road disappeared into a tunnel, so I thought it was the huge tunnel in Baltimore going under the harbor, so I was sort of right. Couldn't figure it out though. girrr...
Lindsey
Lindsey, you're awesome for trying! -Jess
I first thought Baltimore but I've been there enough to know that wasn't it. I had no idea what this was.
These are dumb because I havent been anywhere so I would have no idea what any of these would be!!
I've never been to Boston, either, so it ain't that. -Jess
I've only flown into Boston once and it was at night. So I really haven't been to Boston either. The key, Gillian, is looking for landmarks or distinctive features. For example, did you notice the toll booths on the freeway? Although there are toll booths out west, they are really an eastern thing. Also, you may notice the mudflats that are exposed by low tide. That means that you are looking for a city on the ocean with a toll-way that tunnels underneath the airport. This might be stretching it a bit but looking at shadow placement is also a clue. At the time of year this picture was taken, the sun in the northern hemisphere is more directly overheard, yet there are still shadows on the north side of the buildings. This would indicate that the city we are trying to identify is probably in the northern US. These clues cut down the possibilites to a manageble number of cities. Your next step would be to get on Google Earth and just look at a few of the cites you have choosen.
I enjoy this very much. Thanks, Jess.
Both Adam and I were amused at the complete lack of cars on the roads in the area. The parking lots on the left part of the image (which would have to be rental car lots) have lots of cars, but the roads are pretty empty.
I hadn't even considered the tidal effect in the image. That's a great clue. I did crop the image very specifically to include airport, tunnel, and water, but I didn't think anyone would think of low tide. -Jess
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