Great Photo! Manhattan Solstice on Sunday, May 28 at sunset

[Radio_Lady]

The sun aligned with most Manhattan east-west streets.

This was a great photo opportunity for my husband at Broadway and 42nd Street:



From the NY Times:

Next Sunday (May 28) and also on July 13, the sun will fully illuminate every Manhattan cross street (not the curved or angled ones) on the street grid during the last 15 minutes of daylight, and it will set on each street's center line. The sight is breathtaking.

This is a special photo opportunity, with parts of Manhattan's canyons getting illumination they normally don't get.

If the Manhattan street grid ran north-south and east-west, the alignment days would be the spring and fall equinoxes, the two days when the sun rises due east and sets due west. But the Manhattan grid is angled 30 degrees east from geographic north, shifting the days.

There are two corresponding mornings of sunrise right on the center lines of the Manhattan grid, Dr. Tyson wrote in an e-mail message: Dec. 5, 2006, and Jan. 8, 2007.

Those four solstice days will shift no more than a day over four years as a result of leap days, Dr. Tyson wrote. But the shift is so small that if you went out only on these dates, you would see the effect just fine. "In fact the effect is good for a day on either side of the advertised days, typically offering a range of weather choices for the avid viewer," he wrote.

As for the sunset next Sunday and on July 13, Dr. Tyson wrote, the sun will line up on the center lines just as its falls halfway below the horizon. The official sunset, when "the sun's last smidgen sets below the horizon," lines up on slightly different days, but this one makes for a nicer photo.
Posted at 4:32pm, 24 May 2006 PDT ( permalink )

[KurtNYC]

1. Great photo!

But I don't believe the line up thing. I went out that night and looked down the middle of my street and the sun was to the south of the center line. Your photo is 42nd Street which is wider than most and is taken from the north side of the street....

oh wait, I see "just as its falls halfway below the horizon" -- I didn't wait that long. Will have to check on July 13th.

[Radio_Lady]

2. Here are some other shots on the Internet.

[Radio_Lady]

3. Guess that was just one shot, cropped a couple of ways.

Please let me give credit to the photographer, Neil deGrasse Tyson.

From May 28, 2004

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap040528.html

[Radio_Lady]

4. Here is another solstice shot -- can't help but make you wistful.

R.I.P., World Trade Center and all the lives lost there

[CaliforniaPeggy]

5. My dear Radio_Lady!

Your husband's picture is wonderful!

And the others rank too.....

Thanks for posting these! Not often does one get to see the sun like that!

:hi:

[wildhorses]

6. WOW...thanks for sharing...they are all beautiful

my mother and I are planning a trip to NY one weekend soon to see a play or two. We watched the tonys last weekend and got to talking about how nice it would be...thinking about seeing Jersey Boys for one...

well, anyway ....I LOVE NEW YORK


:hi:

[Radio_Lady]

7. We saw "Guys and Dolls" in London -- it was terrific!

Here's the proof! And New York City was delightful -- but VERY HOT!