Talk:Gravity hill

Anyone try any of these places?

Anyone try any of these places?

I've done the San Antonio one many times. Works everytime with a car, but hardly works with a high-clearance vehicle like a pickup truck or SUV. --Jenn Dolari 12:47, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Apparently there is one in Ireland too, or so my mother used to tell us. She claims to have seen it as a child. I'll ask her when I see her next... --Orelstrigo 22:56, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I've tried the gravity hill in Arcadia, Michigan. It's not as impressive as most claim, and if you study the surroundings for a few minutes the illusion becomes apparent. The illusion also only works from certain angles, and the slope is not very steep at all. For instance, if you look in the direction of a high embankment to the side of the road, the illusion is more apparent than if you go on the other side of the road and look in the direction of a large field. I've been at this same gravity hill twice--once when I was a child and once just this summer. When I came back, I was sorely disappointed--I had remembered it being much larger and steeper, almost valley-like, but that's what memory can do... Gsgeorge 20:40, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I went to Spook Hill in Florida because we happened to be in town. It was incredibly lame. You drive up to a starting line which is at the base of a hill, put the car in neutral and lo and behold, the car rolls backwards down hill just like it would on any other hill in the world. There's no illusion involved. You are clearly on an incline back down the hill and you roll down that hill. It isn't a gravity hill at all as described in the article. The vehicle should appear to roll UPHILL but instead it does exactly what you would expect on any other hill. Kirkmona (talk) 19:43, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

The one in Chartierville, Quebec - just north of the NH border, is excellent. Even though I knew what was happening, it was *very* hard not to believe that our car was rolling uphill. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 14:59, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

By the way, it's not often I get to participate in a discussion that started up after 6 1/2 years of silence! - DavidWBrooks (talk) 15:42, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

This entry badly needs a picture.

This entry badly needs a picture.

I agree a picture would be useful, however the phenomenon results from the gradient of the visible horizon relative to the road and the actual motion of the vehicle. So merely by tilting the camera you could "fake" the effect in a picture, moreover the picture would not capture the rolling of the car. All is not lost however, as the phenomenon can also be seen where rivers flow through areas with sloping rock strata. The sloping strata can give the impression the water is flowing up-hill and a photograph capturing the waves and wakes will give a feel for the direction and dynamic aspect of the effect. I have seen such a photograph and need to track it down. Dave C

Some of this explanation definitely needs to go in the main article. As a clueless reader, it gives me no hint as to how gravity hills "work". Optical illusion, sure, but how exactly? Any relation to documented illusions? JRM 12:28, 2004 Nov 26 (UTC)

OK, I've added an explanation section—it's not perfect or even particularly convincing, but it beats, well, nothing. :-) JRM 18:58, 2004 Dec 3 (UTC)

The one in Ireland is at the Spelga Dam, Co. Down, near to Newcastle. --HispanoCelt 11:17, Nov 26, 2004 (UTC)

How it works

I have seen one of these places in the Smoky Mountians in TN. This place worked by the illusion of the surrondings. This place as a house built on a hillside that was "tilted" compared to the outside.

I'm sure these roads work much the same way. A section of road actually is downhill, but by looking at the surrondings, it would actually look like it was an "uphill" section of road.

Ken

Arcadia

Hey, not to nitpick, but isn't Spook Hill in Michigan in Joyfield Township, not Arcadia? Fishal 05:27, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

This might be true. I've heard from some sources that it's Joyfield Township, and others Arcadia. I'll try to do some definitive research. -Gsgeorge 01:21, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Ok, looks like we're faced with a small problem. The actual intersection of Joyfield and Putney Rd is in Benzie County, about 1200 meters north of the border of Manistee County (in which Arcadia lies). However, both Mapquest and Terraserver acknowledge the intersection as being in Arcadia. With that said, both Benzonia (cool name) and Joyfield Township are very close. Here's where things get even more confusing: at the exact intersection of Joyfield and Putney Roads, there is a small, probably unincorporated community called "Putney Corners". It's on the topographical map on Terraserver here. I have a feeling that the intersection of Joyfield and Putney Roads is some sort of confluence point for several of the townships or communities in the area. It may not actually lie in the municipal boundaries of Arcadia, but Arcadia is certainly the closest large community. Or, maybe the place really does have some supernatural powers! - Gsgeorge 07:28, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Hm. I've been to the hill an emarassingly large amount of times. If there is a "Putney Corners," it's invisible (a spirit realm, perhaps?). The only structure on that intersection is a church. Come to think of it, it's called Blaine Christian Church, and right there is a Blaine Township, Michigan. I've been to the church a couple of times, and I would swear the bulletins said "Joyfield, Michigan." And if you Google search "Blaine Christian Church" you get an ad for an out-of-print book called "History of the Blaine Christian Church and Putney Corners." So it could be anyone's guess what jurisdiction the gravity hill is in. Maybe this land of the otherworldly simply cannot be ruled by the leaders of men. Fishal 04:51, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sometimes maps have old towns that haven't existed for 100's of years. Mapquest has a lot of those in my area (the san francisco bay area). 69.42.5.198 04:57, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Gravity road

the gravity road redirect isn't working. Can somebody fix this? (i don't know how) Jm51 19:08, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Done. Looked like a case problem. Gsgeorge 19:20, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Magnetic Hill in Ladakh Region, India.

I have experienced this phenomenon at the Magnetic Hill in Ladakh Region in India. Small Cars slowly move upwards. On a plain or downward road in this area, its difficult to drive in higher gear. To drive smoothly we have to change to lower gears...--Gktambe, 19:52, Dec 25th, 2006.

Magnetic Hill north of Shenyang, China

Haven't been there in a couple years, but a delightful tourist trap. KateRosok 18:30, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Concerning the devore, CA Gravity hill.

I am doing a report on gravity hills having been to this particular one I do fool alot of people and tell them the story of the school bus that got hit by a train. and the story gose that the kidds spirits from the buss push your car up hill and will stop you from goting over the train tracks. anyway I will be conducting some researh and will share it when I have more information. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 161.38.223.230 (talk) 02:13, 9 March 2007 (UTC).

This one appears notable

The Wisconsin Wonder Spot, locally known since the 1950's, is to be demolished for a roadway. It is also mentioned in this blog about "retro culture". An article in the mainstream media (USA Today) increases its notability. --205.201.141.146 20:19, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Similar effect, but not a hill

Is there a term for the same phenomenon when used in more domestic situations? For example, there is a pub in Dudley in the West Midlands of England called The Crooked House. Unsurprisingly the name derives from the fact that mining subsidence has left the building standing at a severe angle [1]. Inside, shelves have been built out of horizontal in order to accentuate the angles of the walls, meaning that a marble rolled along one of the shelves appears to be running uphill relative to horizontal features, when in fact it is rolling gently downhill relative to the building. So, essentially the same effect, but not using a car and a hillside? DWaterson 00:01, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there's a term for it, beyond optical illusion, but The Crooked House seems notable enough to get its own Wikipedia page. If not, there should be a page for that and similar structures. I know there are non-level or non-square buildings. —Ben FrantzDale 11:06, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Randsburg, CA

This one is from my wife and mother-in-law. The mother in law states that this is the main drive through randsburg, ca (butte ave?) and right in front of the church. She swears its a true magnetic hill because my father-in-law brought a large level out to test the lay of the land. Also, she states that you can put the car on either side of the magnetic hill and the car will roll to the middle point at the 'top'.

I'm in Delaware, so I can't confirm this. Sorry! The church in question might be the Santa Barbara Church built in 1904. 68.82.74.196 (talk) 02:16, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

deleted link to an obvious pseudoscientific webpage

This article said: External links -Scientific Measuring of Anomalies GPS height differences and pendulum oscillation diff. confirmed uphill And links to a (at least in Germany) known private webpage of two authors of pseudoscientific and rather strange books from Berlin who claim to be physicists. Their story shows no scientific measurings at all. The hand-held pendulum used to measure gravity (pendulum gravimeter), together with a hand-held clock, will never produce a usuable result. Fixed mounted and wind-shielded pendulum gravimeters may have at best a precision of about 0.2%. But (real) gravity anomalities on earth are below that value. And a hand-held (!!!) and not wind-shielded pendulum will give a much more poor precision and will never show any gravity anomality at all. The use of a GPS along a street is a better idea, but vertical precision is unfortunately not very good (perhaps 5 m). Google Earth knows that street via dei laghi and you can drive along that street in Rocca di Papa (italy) using your mouse, and Google Earth will show you for every meter the altitude. A topographical map of the region would also make clear if that street is uphill or downhill. So, there is no evidence for any scientific measuring on that page. The authors also omit to calculate the influences of the latitude (here 41 degrees N) and altitude (aprox. 600 m) on gravity itself. There is no reason for such a link. Redecke (talk) 22:22, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Unusual article?

Anyone think we should add this to Wikipedia: Unusual articles? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.172.44.243 (talk) 03:34, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Gravity Hill and “Anti-Gravity Hill”

I just can’t get my head round what the point of the distinction being made in the article, where it begins by listing “A gravity hill, also known as a magnetic hill (and sometimes a mystery hill or a gravity road)”, and then goes on to say that Websites devoted to the paranormal also tend to have names like "Haunted Hill", "Magnetic Hill", or "Anti-gravity Hill", as if Gravity Hill was in some way “more scientific” or “less paranormal” than “Anti-Gravity Hill”. It’s fine to say that people call them this, that or the other, and then say that some people have attributed what is in fact an optical illusion to supernatural forces, but the paragraphs as the stand have no point. Is there a recognized body (for geologists, surveyors, engineers or others in the know), who have defined the term “Gravity Hill” (how it occurs, when it should be applied, etc.) over all the other names? Has some handout gone round the paranormal web-sites to say use these terms, but not Gravity Hill? All hills demonstrate gravit at work if you release the handbrake with your car set on the slope; “Anti-Gravity Hill” actually better expresses the illusion, as it implies the apparent counter-intuitive nature of what seems to happen in these areas. The list of names misses out “Electric Brae”, most popularly applied to the hill at Croy in Scotland, but used elsewhere in Scotland for similar phenomena - but you would find it used both in descriptions in publications and on the web, to attribute scientific or non-scientific solutions to the effect. My point is that suggesting that the initial set of names are “good” and the latter set “bad”, from a scientific, non woo-woo angle is both misleading and wrong. Jock123 (talk) 11:27, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Paranormal?

I’ve asked for a citation for the paranormal connection; I’ve seen the claim loads of times in scientific or sceptical sources; never actually in a paranormal one. Has anybody, or is it just a straw man comment? Moonraker12 (talk) 14:49, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

You're right - I just removed it, make the magnetic/supernatural claim a big more sweeping and general. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 15:18, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

List of gavity hills

I have added the list of gravity hills to 'see also' - I know it's in the first section as well, but it isn't very obvious if you just scan. It is the sort of thing that should be in 'see also'. I made this comment because I saw that someone else has already removed it from 'see also'. If there's some reason for not having it twice, I'd say it's better to have it only in 'see also' Chris.let (talk) 14:58, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

I removed it before I saw your comment here. It's general wikiepdia policy not to duplicate links, and particularly not to duplicate them like this. It's not an absolute rule, or as absolute as wikipedia gets, but it makes sense. You could argue for probably half the wikilinks in any article to be important enough to be listed at the bottom so as not to be ignored. This one is integrated well into the text, and pretty hard to overlook. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 21:29, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

I didn't even know that that existed until you pointed it out, and I was wondering why there wasn't a list. I guess that I get used to seeing so many links in text that suchlike hardly stand out. Vulpecular (talk) 20:54, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

hardly seem a point to having a seperate article that says little more than the description on the list page.. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.3.33.78 (talk) 17:39, 8 July 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Chris.let and Vulpecular: I didn't notice the link to the list before DavidWBrooks pointed it out. The wikilink uses pipe trick, so I thought it was a link to the reference (or anything out), not to the list. So I think it would be OK to repeat the link in the "See also" section, to have a clear link to the list. --Diego Queiroz (talk) 14:43, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

I have un-piped the introduction link to make the article clear. I don't usually like "see XXXXX" sentences in articles, but you make a good point that it's worth being hyper-clear here. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 16:28, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Montana Site

This one brands itself as a "vortex". [2] 24.6.187.181 (talk) 18:49, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

So does the one in Oregon. [3] This mentions the term as well. [4] 24.6.187.181 (talk) 19:01, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

The third link in external references is a broken link. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.72.234.191 (talk) 03:45, 9 June 2016 (UTC)

Optical illusion?

This seems inaccurate. Really, it's a multisensory illusion: it relies on at least two senses, sight and balance, interacting with each other. I don't have experience of gravity hills myself, but the first reference states:

"There are several things that enable us to sense which way is up. The balance mechanism in our inner ears is one system we have, but visual clues are also important and can be overriding."

In other words, a major part of the way gravity hills work is that visual perception affects one's sense of balance, making a slope in one direction feel, not only look, like a level surface or a slope in a contrasting direction. — Smjg (talk) 10:27, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

I see now that it would be a purely optical illusion when viewed on a video screen away from the actual site, and the camera position is such that the illusion occurs. But such a video illusion can be created almost anywhere, not only at a gravity hill. With gravity hills, experienced at the site, while the cause of the illusion is optical, that it affects both visual perception and balance perception is important. — Smjg (talk) 12:19, 21 August 2024 (UTC)