In my numerous walks and couple runs around Moorhead, I’ve noticed objects like this in the overhead lines.
I naturally wonder what the hell it is. Some options:
- It’s part of the city’s (decent and cheap) municipal wi-fi service.
- It’s a way to manage the civic problem of the many, many people who are sticking their bare feet up on the dashboard of vehicles using Moorhead byways.
- It’s an attempt to make the grass grow on any, some, or all of the incredibly patchy lawns in this town.
- It’s a public-health effort to prevent suicides among the readers of the horrific stories on the front page of the Fargo Forum. (Thankfully, the paper requires registration to read the articles, so I can avoid hyperlinking to the gore.)
- It’s a means to try to help the city’s coffeehouse baristas remember more than one item in an order. On three different occasions, I’ve had the barista need me to repeat a two-item order two times; on one of those occasions, I had to say it a third time. Gawd.
What’s that? People are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan? Perhaps that’s related to these mystery coils, too…
(Update, 8/22: According to a well-informed commenter, this is a “fold-back” created with “extra fiber optic cabling that has been relooped on that strand” to make repair or replacement easier later. I LOVE THE INTERNET.)
the object in the picture is actually just extra fiber optic cabling that has been relooped on that strand. It is used later for repairs and other upgrades. Fiber optic cabling is extremely expensive to repair or replace this is a preventive measure taken by the communication company that installed the cable