Fermilab’s Village Houses and the Large Hadron Collider

Share this house! ❤️

Fermilab’s Village houses and the Large Hadron Collider.

Remember hearing about the Large Hadron Collider that was looking for …..the God particle.  Science looking for God was attention grabbing big news.

Here is a bit of what the Large Hadron Collider is and then onto Fermilab Village:

The Large Hadron Collider is an underground super collider stretching through France and Switzerland that was scheduled to start slamming accelerated streams of particles at targets back in 2008.

There was concern at the time that particle collisions would create tiny black gravity holes that would consume everything around them..first France,

then Switzerland,

then the Earth,

and then our whole solar system.

Also back in 2008, two scientist opposed to the Large Hadron Collider filed a lawsuit against the “US Department of Energy, Fermilab, CERN, the National Science Foundation and Does 1-100” for fear of creating just that..tiny, black-swallowing gravity holes.

via –Skeptoid

Wikimedia Commons

Wilson Hall is the hub of activity on the Fermilab campus.

The above named Fermilab in the lawsuit is in and/or on the border of Warrenville, Illinois where I live.  Fermilab was the world’s second largest energy particle accelerator.

When I first found out about Fermilab after moving to Warrenville, I had a lot of questions swirling around in my brain.  

How safe am I living so close to this particle smashing type property and am I going to wake up dead someday?

What if something goes wrong?

How far away from it do you need to live to be safe?

Where are other colliders located in the world?

My imagination ran wild until I ran out of wild end-of-the-world scenarios much like we all did after learning about the Large Hadron Collider.  But, I still don’t fully trust what I can’t understand.

Before 9/11 anyone could drive through Fermilab.  As locals we often used Fermilab’s roads as a short-cut to get from one heavy traffic road to another.  We also used to drive through to see the fenced bison on the property.  

One thing about Fermilab I always thought of as odd was their little houses on the property.  The houses were all white, all the same size, and it never looked like anyone lived in them.  In my imagination, the houses resembled 1950s experimental nuke sites.  Get me out of here, this is creepy.

Today, I took a ride to Fermilab to see if the houses are still there.  I was not sure I could gain entrance.  The guard at the gate came out to stop me from entering.  He said I could not drive through.  When I told him I did not want to drive through, but just wanted to take pictures of the little white houses the scientist live in for my blog, to my surprise he gave me the go ahead with a look at my identification.  So that in itself was a little adventure.

Actually anyone can ride their bike or walk on the property during hours of operation.  It is just that when 9-11 happened, they immediately closed the property to through traffic specifically and probably any traffic initially.

Fermilab Village:  The houses aren’t white anymore.  They are however, painted unattractive bright colors.  I named this color Particle Smashing Orange.

Popping Bright Blue.

Muon Maroon.  There are four or five orange houses, four or five maroon houses, and so on.

Dark Matter Blue.

But what is missing?  I know people are living there as I saw a big screen TV inside one of the windows.  What is missing is the lack of anything personal..at all, other than this bike parked in the front.  Eerily..no bushes or flowers in the front of the house or on the side or back.

All clustered together in a circle of two blocks.  Kind of like a summer camp or scene from the TV show LOST.  I am under the impression that visiting scientist live here.

There is also a half circle of large older houses that are all white.

A couple of these large white houses have some bushes, but most are barren of personal effects.  This porch has a few chairs indicating signs of life.

What I did not take a picture of (and I should have) was I saw a small playground area for little children or perhaps it is a daycare; in Particle Smashing Orange of course.

Occasionally when grocery shopping locally, I will see a foreign family and hear them speaking some exotic language discussing grocery items and think to myself they are probably Fermilab guests.

I went to a Christmas party one year at the neighbors.  One of their guests and fellow neighbor works at Fermilab.  I had seen her around, but never talked to her.  I barely understood a word she said.  I vaguely recall the host translating for me.  The words she used were beyond the norm of conversation.

I don’t think everyone at Fermilab talks like this, but when it comes to physicists, black holes, and particle detectors, it’s all alien to me like the odd look-alike houses in Fermilab Village.

Fermilab map via fnal.gov

A cool little map of Fermilab to give you a perspective.  I entered at the East Gate and it was a short drive to Fermilab Village on the right.

~ Thank you for visiting my friends.  Have a Happy Day ~

For more smashing color see Orange Houses – Exterior House Colors

Share this house! ❤️