A Public Stargazing Observatory is One Step Closer to a New Home in The Bronx

[music]

Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Well, good news for New York City. For so many years space enthusiasts have wanted to create an observatory that's open to the public in New York City, and this goal is finally on its way to becoming a reality. Have you heard this yet? The observatory will be coming from Nassau Community College where it was located for students and faculty to use until the school decided to replace it with a green roof. Now, the observatory could have gone to waste, but local astronomers rushed to save it.

The Amateur Astronomers Association, which led the project, scrambled quickly to find a new home for it, and this halftime steel observatory will be moving to the Bronx at the Burroughs High School of Science, maybe you've heard of it. It will be the city's first public observatory. Here to speak with us about the details, including how you'll be able to use this super exciting new project, Rosemary Misdary, Metro science reporter here at WNYC and Gothamist, and Bart Fried, Executive Vice President of The Amateur Astronomers Association and he's a telescope historian. Hey, Rosemary and Bart Fried, thanks for joining us. Welcome to WNYC.

Bart Fried: Thank you for having us.

Rosemary: Hi, Brian. Thank you.

Bart Fried: Yes, thank you for having us.

Brian Lehrer: Rosemary, you want to start with a little bit about the history behind the Nassau Community College observatory? Why did they decide to get rid of it and why were scientists so interested in saving it?

Rosemary: Well, that dome was used by their astronomy students for over 40 years and they decided that they wanted to modernize, and part of that was putting in a green roof and they try to keep it on the building, but they realized they had no space for it. It was replaced by several air-mounted telescopes, but the thing is that Dr. Tom Bruckner, who is the head of the Physical Sciences Department at Nassau Community College said that they don't build them like they used to. This is a very well constructed built-to-last observatory. He didn't want to see it go to waste, and he got a lot of takers for it, but ultimately The Amateur Astronomers Association in New York got ahold of it first.

Brian Lehrer: They weren't going to throw out the observatory. I'm thinking, who throws out in observatory, but Bart, that was never actually the plan, right?

Bart Fried: No, actually it wasn't the plan, but it was very much a possibility because early on back in 2019 when they first removed it from the roof there were no takers for it. You have to have a place to put it, and it's reasonably sizeable. It's 2 meters wide and about 9.5 or 10 feet tall, and it's pretty big for anybody's backyard. For about the first year, no, there were no takers. Then we stepped forward, but we had a lot of difficulty also, interestingly, trying to find a place for it here in New York City. 

Brian Lehrer: We'll get into the process of how it's going to wind up coming to the Jerome Reservoir Bronx High School of Science area there in the Bronx, but tell people, Bart, what the experience of being in an observatory is? Is it like one really super-duper telescope and people look through it one at a time, or how does that work?

Bart Fried: It can work a number of ways, but that is typically the case. You have a good telescope in there. You may have some auxiliary telescopes attached to it, but generally, because of the configuration of the dome, you need the telescope to be centralized within the observatory.

Brian Lehrer: Why do you need a dome?

Bart Fried: Well, keeps the wind off, keeps the rain off, keeps the weather off, and more importantly, especially in New York, it keeps the stray light out, and we have streetlights all over the place.

Brian Lehrer: Noticed that.

Bart Fried: You want to be dark-adapted or as dark-adapted as you can be in New York City. Having a dome around you really does help you see things that would be even more difficult to see without it.

Brian Lehrer: How big is this telescope?

Bart Fried: The telescope which we just picked up yesterday it's an 11-inch diameter telescope with a focal length of just about 2 meters long, but it's in a more compact shape because it has a folded system so to speak, but that's a pretty large aperture for a city observing, but it will let us see things that a smaller telescope wouldn't be able to see.

Brian Lehrer: You said you just picked it up yesterday. What does it weigh?

Bart Fried: Well, when I say picked it up, it was donated to us yesterday.

Brian Lehrer: You got to do a U-Haul truck and drove out to Nassau County or what does that mean?

Bart Fried: No, actually it was here in the city. Our Vice President of Operations picked it up. It's about a hundred pounds, maybe 80 pounds. It's hefty but it'll be on a pier. We'll pier mount it in the dome, and we have our eyes on a pier that goes up and down hydraulically. That would make it very easy for little kids on the one hand and adults, on the other hand, to be able to use the telescope without kids having to climb up a big ladder.

Brian Lehrer: Rosemary, you wrote, "Over nearly 200 years, several stargazers have tried and failed to set up the city's first public observatory according to the International Planetarium Society." Why was the public observatory project so difficult to accomplish?

Brian Lehrer: Are you saying this is not officially a done deal or sealed until they actually build it and install it, that there are still hoops to jump through to see if this is going to happen at all?

Rosemary: They have to get a construction permit. They have to get approvals from the Department of Buildings, and also from the public design committee. Am I forgetting something Bart?

Bart Fried: No, I think those are the three, and we don't anticipate problems with that process because we can meet their requirements without any difficulty. It's actually a simple construction project and it's really just a matter of going through the process. Knowing that we won't have any problems meeting the requirements, which are very minimal, truly, I'll say it's a 90% done deal. The Parks Department in their favor were really on board when we presented them with the proposal. They thought it was an exciting idea.

They liked the idea that it's in the Bronx, although it will be an observatory for the entire city. They also liked the idea that it was near the high school and other high schools and Lehman Colleges right down the street, which has an astronomy program. I believe Manhattan College also has an astronomy program, but neither of those colleges have observatories. Between all the schools in the area, and the public work that The Amateur Astronomers Association does already, it's a win for everybody, and it isn't going to cost the parks a dime and it's not going to cost the Board of Education a dime.

Our organization is just basically covering all the costs, either through our own financing or through a fundraising that we're doing. It's just a great little project.

Brian Lehrer: We have talked about a few-

Bart Fried: You asked a--

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead.

Bart Fried: Brian you asked a good question.

Brian Lehrer: What's that?

Bart Fried: Why is it so difficult in New York to have a public observatory? Attempts were made going back into the 1850s. New York City is actually the founding city for the American Astronomical Society back in the 1800s. There were attempts to put it in Brooklyn. There were attempts to put a public observatory in Central Park. I think at least two attempts in central park. At one point they had raised over $200,000, then the civil war hit and that just put an end to everything. It's just been an uphill climb since then as New York has grown and rebuilt itself many times in the interim.

If you look at other cities, especially Los Angeles, which has a Griffith Park Observatory, which is up on the hill right by the Hollywood hill sign. It's a magnificent iconic city observatory, and they shoot movies up there and they get, I don't know, a couple million people I think go through there a year. It's a tremendous tourist draw. To do that in Central Park or in any of the major parks in the city is a huge undertaking compared to what we're doing. We decided to go grab the low-hanging fruit first, which is to put a small little observatory and get it started. People can see what it's all about and then we move on from there.

Brian Lehrer: The Jerome Reservoir is a great location. I happen to live walking distance from there and have walked there and walked around the reservoir. That's a great spot. I'm going to ask you in a minute to describe more about what that's going to be like over there. Listeners, have you ever used a public observatory telescope? Not just some-- I know we have stargazing hobbyists listening right now, but you probably use your own little or telescopes. Who listening has ever used a public observatory, real world-class, major league telescope, and wants to talk about the experience?

If you have any questions for our guests, our own Metro science correspondent, Rosemary Misdary, who's reporting on this, and our guest Bart Fried, from the Amateur Astronomers Association which is helping facilitate this creation of the first public observatory in New York City, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or tweet your question at Brian Lehrer. Rosemary in your article on Gothamist you told a little of this story, so I don't know if you and Bart both went away in on this, but it's interesting about the location you wrote while hosting a sidewalk astronomy event near The Bronx High School of Science, it dawned on the members of the Amateur Astronomers Association that they were standing in the perfect location.

Do you want to tell that story a little bit Rosemary, or should I go to Bart on that?

Rosemary: You know what, I'll start it off because I think one thing that's really important and I think it's very special that it's going up in the Bronx is that people don't go to the Bronx a lot. Manhattan and Brooklyn are destination places, and then you get up to the Bronx and then you realize how awesome it is. Bart will tell you the rest of the dawning on them that they were in like the perfect location because they got such a great response when they did their first sidewalk stargazing event. Bart, do you want to take it away?

Bart Fried: Sure. Prior to that, we had been turned down by the National Park Service and Floyd Bennett Field. We had gotten turned down by the new Shirley Chisholm State Park along the Belt Parkway. We were looking for another location and we were getting pressure to pick up the dome. We had committed to taking it, but we didn't want to move it twice if we could avoid it. We did a sidewalk astronomy event right by Harris-- I think it's Harris Park. This was the first time in a long, long time that AAA had done a public event in the Bronx. We've been trying recently to increase our outreach into areas that we don't go to often.

Brian Lehrer: Harris Park, by the way, a great, great big park. I know Harris Park. Athletic fields, The Bronx Science, and Lehman High School, and others use, right?

Bart Fried: Yes. In fact, it was a lot of softball games going on the evening we were there. People were coming and going from the park. We were actually on the southeast corner, not necessarily near Bronx Science, but we know it's there. Not long after that when we were scrambling to find a new site I recalled that The Bronx Science astronomy students-- the high school students were starting to show up at a lot of our events. They get extra credit if they come to our astronomy events.

We thought, well, what about that area? I started looking at some aerial maps and I didn't realize it, but there's this whole big reservoir there. There is the strip of land along Golden Avenue next in-between Bronx Science and the reservoir and it's empty. These strips of land are totally not used for anything. We looked at that and the sites were good. The horizon is good, especially to the west over the reservoir. There's nothing blocking our view. We were initially looking at a spot north of the reservoir's building there.

They said there's some things happening underneath the surface, so they wanted us to move to the other side a little further away from the high school. Maybe a couple hundred yards further. We went back out and took a look at that location and realized it was probably better even than the first location because it has fewer streetlights. While there is lighting in the park we were concerned at first, but it's not the big stadium-style lights that just massively light the places. There are just some highlights so the ball players can play into the evening, but it it's really nothing prohibitive.

Since we'll be observing inside the dome, unless the dome slit is pointed at the park itself you don't even see those lights at all. It's a great site. It's very close to the high school. It's close to Lehman College and the other schools in the area.

Brian Lehrer: I guess I've seen conflicting reports. Is it going to be in Harris Park, or is it going to be along the reservoir?

Bart Fried: Along the reservoir. Close to the fence.

Brian Lehrer: We're getting some calls from people who are in public astronomy groups elsewhere in the Metro area. Again, what's new about this is it's going to be the first open-to-the-public public observatory in New York City's history. Here is Paul in White Plains who runs a public astronomy events event in high schools up there, I think. Paul, you're on WNYC, hi.

Paul: How're you doing? Yes. In coordination with another teacher at our high school, we open our telescope to the general public once or twice a month. We try to get the students to help run this and gives them an opportunity to do these outreach.

I don't know if they ever really made it truly public, but if anyone was invited. It was the giant refractor that sits on top of the Pupin building was used. I don't even know if that's even still there. Finally, and I'll do this really quickly, which is one of the ideas we've entertained and we haven't gotten the grant yet for it which is to put a CCD camera on the telescope and project it on a monitor as well as providing opportunities to look for it so that when you have large groups, they can appreciate the real-time view as well.

Brian Lehrer: Paul, thank you very much. That's interesting about like you go to sporting events these days [laughs] and you can look with your own eyes from the seats. Some of the places like the Dallas Cowboys football stadium, and some other places have these gigondo screens where you might even be able to see things better by looking at the screen, unfortunately, than looking with your own eyes. Will there be the opportunity for groups to see what the person using the telescope at that moment is seeing?

Bart Fried: Sure, absolutely. Yes. What the caller was describing is known as electronically assisted astronomy. Especially because of COVID that aspect of public viewing came on very strong. It's also useful to help us meet the ADA requirements that we need to meet because it's a public facility on public land. We will have cameras hooked up probably not through the main telescope, but through an auxiliary telescope attached to it. The cameras are extremely sensitive today.

You can take images in the middle of the city with a small telescope and a camera that rival what came out of the best public or best professional observatories anywhere in the world, 20, 30 years ago. The software is available. The technology is there to really make it easy. When AAA does public observing sessions we set up other telescopes as well We will be accommodating reasonably large groups. It'll be our dream come true to see school buses pull up with 20, 30 kids piling off, getting ready to look through telescopes.

Brian Lehrer: That's great.

Bart Fried: That's what we do.

Brian Lehrer: One more experience from a neighboring town, Kevin in Westport you're on WNYC. I see you're on the Westport Astronomical Society, right, Kevin?

Kevin: Yes. Hi, Brian. First, [inaudible 00:20:31] or a longtime listener big [inaudible 00:20:32]

Brian Lehrer: Thank you.

Kevin: We in Westport [inaudible 00:20:35] very large telescope.

Kevin: It's often-

Brian Lehrer: -your telephone doesn't and I think I'm going to have to drop this call. Kevin, I apologize. I see from our screener, he's going to say that they've got a 25-inch scope open to the public. I don't know if you want to check with the Westport Astronomical Society to see how they bring folks in successfully. One more, Elaine, from where this telescope is coming near in the Norwood section of the Bronx. You're on WNYC. Hi, Elaine.

Elaine: Hi, Brian. This is not my first time calling, but I'm really excited to be calling in for such a great thing. I have two boys in school and they will both be benefiting from having this so local. We can walk to the telescope. It's definitely been a buzz. On the neighborhood sites, Norwood, Bedford, everyone's talking about this because it's just such a great opportunity, not just for Bronx Science, but for all the schools in our neighborhood, elementary, junior high, high school, and like you said, the colleges. We were just super excited about this.

Brian Lehrer: Elaine, thank you very much for that testimonial. As we run out of time, Bart, can you only do this at night? The student groups who are going to come, is it going to be at night?

Rosemary: Great question.

Bart Fried: That's a great question. No, we do a lot of solar observing. We use both white light filters so that we can look at sunspots and we have specialized telescopes that can look at the sun in selective wavelengths such as the H-alpha zone of the spectrum and that will show us prominences and solar flares and solar storms that you can't see with a white light filter. We will have it available to do safe, I'll stress that safe solar viewing.

Brian Lehrer: Rosemary, you got any last thought here? Have you ever gotten to look through a professional observatory telescope?

Rosemary: Yes. It's one of the most distinct memories of my childhood. To me, what was so intriguing about this idea of having this for New Yorkers is that we always talked about meeting people's needs but beyond just basic needs, we need to provide inspiration to our communities. I think a telescope is one of those ways that we can provide inspiration to others.

Brian Lehrer: Bart, when this opens you got to give Rosemary Misdary our Metro science reporter at WNYC and Gothamist who wrote this up. You got to give really early access so she can tell all the people.

Bart Fried: Oh, yes. We're very excited and we will have what's traditionally known as a first light party so that when the dome opens up we'll have a big to-do and of course, Rosemary will be a guest of honor.

Rosemary: Thank you.

Brian Lehrer: We're going to save the tape. He said it out loud. Bart Fried, Executive Vice President of the Amateur Astronomers Association and a telescope historian. Thank you and Rosemary, as always, thanks for coming on.

Rosemary: Thank you.

Bart Fried: Thank you very much.

Copyright © 2022 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.