What is it?
Planet Trek Dane County (PTDC) was first installed in April 2009 as a celebration of the International Year of Astronomy by UW Space Place and partners. PTDC is a temporary installation uniting science education, art, and outdoor recreation. It was first on display from April-October 2009 and has been removed for the winter of 2010. PTDC is, at heart, a scale model of our solar system: We shrunk the Sun, planets, and other bodies by the same factor so that the sizes and distances are represented to scale relative to each other. In our model, the scale is about 200 million to 1. This means the Sun is a sphere about 24 feet in diameter at Monona Terrace, and Pluto the size of a marble in Mt. Horeb. NEW IN 2010: An interactive sun dial on the grass next to the Sun!