Not too long ago, this pylon appeared unheralded in my too-quaint neighborhood of tiny, turn-of-the-last-century brick and stucco houses in Boston. It’s not the Bunker Hill Monument. And it’s not one of those fake-authentic wrought-iron carriage posts, either. It’s electronic—but what is it?
It’s about twenty feet tall, sports what appears to be a microphone on top, and a couple of formidably-locked boxes are bolted at head level.
Is it an ambient sound monitor? Experimental telecommunications device? Beacon for the coming robot invasion? I’m posting my shoddy cameraphone shots here in hopes that some Gearfuse reader has an answer.
November 12, 2010 11:07am
Is it one of those microphones that detect gunfire, and then dispatches the police to the area?
November 12, 2010 11:53am
Wow, it looks like the Žižkov TV Tower (Prague), in miniature!
http://bit.ly/Kr90Y
Following its big brother’s example, maybe “someone” might feel inspired to superglue some David ?erný-like acrylic crawling babies to its side…
November 12, 2010 11:58am
Sorry, that’s David Cerny, czech him out here:
http://bit.ly/bubwoZ
November 12, 2010 16:00pm
I wondered about the gunfire-detection system too, Tim. Boston installed such a network recently, but not (so far as I know) in my neighborhood. I wonder if it monitors ambient noise from other sources.
November 14, 2010 23:28pm
Around where I live, these are used to monitor air traffic noise pollution. However I’m sure they could be used to detect other noises as well.