alt Hacker NewsPutting astronomy on the dark side of the moon would probably work better than putting it into space because you can use some local material for construction.
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The far side of the moon would be useful for a radio observatory where one can block the noisy Earth while taking advantage of the ability to construct large collection area dishes (think Arecibo in a crater - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Crater_Radio_Telescope )
As to the dark side of the moon, I would suggest a read of the story "A Walk in the Sun" - https://www.baen.com/Chapters/0671878522/0671878522___1.htm (the dusk terminator moves at about 10 mph (15 kph) at the equator).
In space though you can do extremely lightweight construction because structures don't need to support their weight against gravity unless they are huge enough that tidal forces matter.
Like O'Neill's research group killed off the plan with the big cylinders because you would construct solar power satellites out of plastic films with vapor deposited metal and semiconductors and these would be light enough to send up from Earth and assemble in space.
I have read elsewhere that spinning mercury would be used as the mirror.
There isn't a single "dark side" of the moon that's always in darkness, the "dark side" of the moon is the side that always faces away from us (poor choice of name). It's fully illuminated during a new moon.
Lunar regolith would probably be quite damaging to optics. It's nasty stuff. I have seen ideas for building liquid mirror telescopes on the moon, though.