BRC sun/wind direction map?

[dragonpilot]

I have an app on my phone that works well...Sun Surveyor Lite...if that wasn't mentioned earlier.

[Canoe]

How does this look?

Sunrise, sunset and solar noon look credible. Not so sure about the arc that runs between them, but it's hard to tell at that perspective.
Be nice if you could add hourly lines out to the arc.

Seems hard to tell where the sun will be coming from, from the perspective of someone's camp, for setting up a camp layout with shade structures.

I haven't run numbers yet this year as I've not seen this years map nor the specific location on the playa.

[Popeye]

I suppose it's accurate enough but the convention in North America is north at the top of the map, makes it hard to read.
But, maybe whoever drew this is from the southern hemisphere?

How does this look?

[Canoe]

...
But, maybe whoever drew this is from the southern hemisphere?

I think the difficulty is in finding a perspective of a 3D model that provides one with a meaningful look & feel of what is happening, when that model shows a hugely reduced scale.

With the above flat views, you can see the direction the sun will be at, hence where your shadow will fall. And for how far, if one looks at the elevation at that time. Most people who've paid attention to sun direction & elevation can quickly wrap their head around making a model in their mind of where the sun will be. I have that ingrained, both from doing my maps and from being on the ground at BRC and seeing the through the day. But for someone who hasn't been to BRC, or has never paid attention close attention to the sun's arc regarding solar collection or creating shade, I don't know how quickly they really form an idea of that.

With that 3D model, the 3D arc is valid for someone standing at the Man, but is viewed from above ground from the NE. At the scale representation of the drawing, that's problematic, as if at Solar Noon one is standing at the South side of BRC by Walk-in camping, the sun will not be overhead to the North between Walk-in and the Man... And if you're over at Gate, the sun will not be up in the sky to the ESE...
You'd have to scale the view out a lot to have the line intuitively show that the sun at Solar Noon will be to the South up at 58 degrees. You can 'read' that from the drawing, but it's not an obvious relative presentation.
If you view that model from the South, so North is "up", the sun's arc at that scale would be even more misleading.

If you imagine that your camp is at the Man, then that presentation of the arc becomes a lot more usable.

[Dactylion]

Here’s one that’s not spot on accurate, but seems to help people visualize the elements better...

BRC3Dsolwind.jpg

[DoctorIknow]

As much as one wants to set up both for sun and wind, you may find yourself with NO CHOICE about putting your "housing" footprint as desired.

Therefore, have shade for any side ready.
Have your shade structure not dependent on ideal setup, and make that structure strong.
If you have a tent with your door facing the wind with no vehicle to block it, perhaps have extra shadecloth to stretch from your shade structure diagonally to the ground, deeply rebar or lag screw it in the ground and that will take some stress away from your door and the tent in general.

[jasonk]

At least since 2014 (I don't know about earlier), the city/sun alignment has been consistent. Does anyone know why?

It can't be for "sunrise over The Man", the alignment is bad for that. Someone proposed it's so the airport runway can be on one side of the pentagon, and line-up well with proper winds for take-off/landing.

The only possibly-intentional "sun alignment" I see, is that 2:00 road seems to consistently line-up quite closely with sunset.

[silverfish]

I think it's so the 6 o clock/ 12 o clock axis aligns with the length of the playa. Said a different way, if you stand at center camp facing the man - you look down the length of the playa. If the 6/12 axis pointed north you'd look at much closer mountains.

I imagine this is to give greater space for art to inhabit a blank canvas. Less clutter in the background, a sense of a larger, more infinite space.

[Token]

The alignment has been steady more or less this whole millennium.

Why did Rod do it that way... ??? Hard to say and we can't ask anymore.

You will just have to take it as a grand Playa mystery.

RIP Rod.