I recently visited Paris, and while walking across the Place de la Concorde I noticed several brass strips set in the pavement, pointing in various directions, with metal studs set in the cobblestones in the road, continuing the alignment. They seemed to intersect on the Cleopatra’s Needle (Obélisque de Luxor).
They don’t seem to point in any obvious compass direction, so I was wondering what they represent. I haven’t been able to find anything on the web.
They don’t show up in Google Maps’ aerial photos, but they can be seen in Street View. Here are a few examples:
Link - you can see four of the metal studs in front of the white car. If you pan to the right about 90 degrees, you can see another line of studs, just beyond the pedestrian crossing.
Link - a little further on, looking back along the line of studs towards the obelisk.
Link - a different line, you can see two of the studs in the road, then a line across the paving stones beyond, just left of the lamp post.
There are more on the other side of the obelisk.
Anyone know what they show? I can’t believe they went to all the trouble of installing them for no reason at all!