I lived in San Diego for 27yrs “1973-2001” I belonged to the Balboa Park R.R. Museum Layout Club. That was a blast" But with that level of layout your have to go thru hoops and that is made clear up front. I also was part of one in the town I purchased my house at some 8yrs later. Poway Ca outside of S.D…
I don’t know , I guess it’s I’m retired and enjoying my R.R. and my Wife. not really in that order.
I have visited Phoenix some years ago where I was able to see the BNSF AC6000 which I am very fond of. Bless all your ventures and your consists are making money.
Lived in S.D. for years and loved it. Did a “G” scale and “HO” at my house. Now I’m retired and built a 12 X 16 2 story shop downstairs and R.R. upstairs. Suits my needs great and that’s all I want. I was pretty much the youngest in the group. Heck I’m 57yrs old. Guess what was there. I felt like I was with my Uncles all the time. Oh well live and learn.
Nick, I’m in the same boat; retired, enjoying my wife and my RR. And thank you for your blessings. My fictional pike makes a pretty good dollar hauling coal. So, much so, that the owner, an eccentric gentleman who grew up riding the rails has managed to purchase trains from the transitional period for railfanning trips. That way I can model whatever motive power and rolling stock I want. [swg]
I have a similar sign that states " No wrath hath no furry when Grandpa’s trains are stopped for " nonsense, needless, notorious, and above all, STUPID, reasons. SO THINK BEFORE ASKING.
At first I I thought everyone was goofing around with Slapstick humor, But, learned later from some friends that I was being blamed for something I didn’t do. Like removed a bridge from the layout to fix because it kept getting hit. Well I built it in my area so I thought I could remove it. WRONG> you need permission first. I am not 10yrs old. Been MR for over 20yrs. Well didn’t like so I thought I would take a break. Went on inactive status for awhile. well 1 month goes by and they decide to think I quit received a letter from the accepting my resignation Oh well who needs the drama. you want drama watch the Young and The Restless .
I have been in only one official club, about 25 years ago. I thought it was a way to stay active in the hobby while living in an apartment. It turned out to be like a lot of what I have just read. Very clique-ish. When after three months of being a prospect (sounds like a biker club), there was an anonymous vote. I got in, but some of the comments had nothing to do with friendship. It was clear to me from the start that some of the guys for some reason just did not think I belonged there. Some of the group were great and I learned a lot from them and got my love of operations. Needless to say I quit after about four or five months.
Jump to today. I am in with a group of folks and we have a clinic-gab session once a month. I have had the best modeling time of my life for the last seven years. I even got my wife hooked. She is now one of the organizers for presenters. We are a very informal group with no rules or officers, and everyone that comes in the door is treated like family right from the start. Some of us have op sessions that anyone that is interested in can sign up to run trains. A lot of truly gifted modelers that will take the time for any question. And some world class railroads to share with the group.
So don’t think there is no place to fit in, some times things just don’t work out. I thought I would be a loner for ever. Now I don’t think I would be half as active if it wasn’t for our group. We are The Skagit Valley and Whidbey Modelers Group. You can find us in the NMRA Pacific Northwest Region. We have fun with trains! Isn’t that what it’s all about?
Without checking my joining date, I would guess that I have been a member of the Columbia Gorge Model Railroad Club (CGL reporting marks) for about 10 years now. Being a member has been a GREAT experience, I have been in MRing since I can remember, and I have still learned a LOT, and more importantly, met a bunch of Wonderful People.
Our club has managed to avoid most of the ploiticking, and that is with approx 150 members of various active statuses. The CGMRC is predictably an HO club, and my intrests have moved to O Gauge, between that and schedule changes, I have changed my membership from Senior to Absentee, but when I do manage to get to the club, I am always warmly welcomed.
Our layout scenery is set in the Potland, OR to Wishram, WA locale circa 1950’s, but equipment from all eras and areas are run, EOTs are seen, but the most common EOT is a Caboose, serious effort is made to keep the consists era appropriate from power to EOT in any given train, but it is not uncommon to see my Challenger hauled passenger train meet an SD 70 powered freight. It is nice to have a layout where 100 car trains can be run without chasing their own caboose
I am Glad that I joined our club, I am Sorry to hear that some clubs have a harder time enjoying the Hobby than ours does, that’s not to say there are never any disagreements, but it seems that we seem to find an answer that most can agree with.
Come visit our club during our November shows, and if there is a big bearded guy surrounded by Union Pacific steam in the roundhouse area, say Hi, and BS a bit.
Nick, Sounds like they did you a favor. This obviously was not the club for you and you would have been wasting your time and efforts had you stayed. I’ve always been a lone wolf for that very reason. I have never been in a model railroad club but I have been in other professional and social clubs and they all have the same benefits and drawbacks. I would say if you have the money to build your own and have no desire to be involved in politics, then do your own thing. Life is too short.
What should you do? What do you mean What should you do? You can’t do anything about THAT club. If they voted you out, they voted you out. You probably either: didn’t belong there anyway; or don’t WANT to be there anyway. {now did you?} I wouldn’t want to be anywhere they wouldn’t want me or that didn’t fit my needs.
The problem I see with clubs as mentioned here OFTEN in postings is: politics. If you don’t follow the club politics, you won’t get along with them! The politics could be a variety of things, but if you are the proverbial square peg that is trying to fit in a round hole, you will loose out.
Sorry for your bad experience. You can be a lone wolf, or you can try for a new club. New friends may be hard to find, but perhaps you will. I prefer to be a lone wolf…as the other common phrase for MRRing comes to mind…“It’s MY Railroad and I’ll run it how I want to”!!! You can do that as a lone wolf.
Don’t let one club experience turn you off. Find a place where you feel comfortable. If after about a dozen meetings… no one recalls your name… that’s a clue…
Clubs are a great source of friendships and a way to really learn the hobby. Most clubs do have a period or time frame that they model to but will occasionally have an open session where a member can run some “special”.
Additional to my railroad habit… I have two old cars and frequented a local club. After three years and no one would engage me in a conversation on a tour… I didn’t get on with them this last year.
It is easy for regular members to fall into small groups and hardly notice a new guy or visitor. Some groups are smart enough to see this happen to themselves and work hard on greeting new people. Some don’t get it and are not taking on new members and are in overall decline.
In Boise we don’t have a club railroad as such. Mostly individuals with their own pikes. We gather monthly at a pizza joint for lunch and then go visit a few local railroads. We usually draw over thirty people to these. We work hard at recognizing new people and introducing them. We have a few layouts that are open for operations to all comers on a weekly basis. Almost always a visitor finds a throttle in his hand before the session is very far along.
We have two NMRA sanctioned meets per year and draw about fifty to such gatherings. New people ride a discount and are recognized during the general meeting that goes with such gatherings.
Look for a mix of ages and interests… that should be a clue to a pretty healthy place.
I don’t belong to a club per se, but I do participate with the Reading Company Technical and Historical Society modular display when I can. Politics? Oh, there’s plenty of it, but I just ignore it and run my trains and talk to visitors with questions.
Interesting discussion. Kind of have two minds about things. Full disclosure: I don’t belong to a club, don’t know of any withing reasonable distance. However if there were, I’d consider a try.
Now, some thoughts on clubs/groups in general. I’ve been a Scout leader for several years, as well as local youth soccer club. One of the things I’ve noticed is in general a very small percentage of the members do 90% of the work. Ask for volunteers for a project and 20% never volunteer. 40% “would do it if it were another day/time/etc.” 30% show up, but stand around drinking coffee and kibitzing. And 10% wind up spending a 12 hour day setting up Pinewood derby track, running the race, serving food, and clean up afterward.
Oh, and the 20% who never volunteer? Well, they’re the first to belly up for pizza and pecan pie, first to complain about something, and first to get out the door when clean up time comes.
Not that it has anything to do with the OP’s situation, just sitting here exhausted after another soccer day.
OK, this may seem like a dissenting opinion against the prevailing winds of this thread…
While “NMRA Achievement Award standard” is a bit of an exaggeration, having clear club standards for rolling stock is pretty important for reliability. There’s nothing more frustrating than poor quality equipment that derails all over the place. Standards for weight, couplers and trucks are very important to good operation. Standards about accuracy are more optional.
Also modelling a specific prototype doesn’t make a club evil. That’s exactly what my club does. Our layout is a specific railway (Canadian Pacific) in a specific area (Sudbury, ON region) in a specific time frame (1970-79). OK, maybe that’s not for everyone, but everyone who joins the club knows exactly what the club is about. Such a clearly defined modelling goal/theme (yes, it is actually even written into the constitution and bylaws) has the advantage of reducing politics to almost nothing. We know what the club’s plans are and there’s no debates between groups wanting to pull the club direction one way or the other; add in a narrow guage logging line for example, rebuild an area to replace one industry with another, that sort of thing. Those decisions were made a long time ago.
I don’t see any thing “wrong” with a club having standards - or specifics on the types or time era of items run on the club’s rails. Of course this assumes that these standards are made clear to a prospective member. With that, the prospective member makes a choice to join or not - and if he joins, he will comply with the “rules of the road”. Nothing at all wrong with that - IMHO.
I suspect the reason the OP was “kicked out” of the club in question had to do more with personality and/or attitudes - either his or those of the other members. The OP is probably a lot better off out of that atmosphere, and maybe should look to start his own club!
Clubs are a two way street, you get out of them what you put into them! The only model railroad club I ever belonged to had been a modular club that got a building built for it by the city it was in. The stipulation for the building was that the club run trains on Fridays and Saturdays from 5:00 to 8:00; during the summer season. After a few years of having to drive 60 some miles round trip to just run trains, I grew board with the club. It was a great group of guys, I just was not interested in what their focus was, so I stopped being a member.
I also Fly Radio Controlled Model Airplanes and have been in clubs involved in this hobby. Two were a bunch of fun to be in and one, the last one, lacks clear goals; or has goals I don’t understand; or, don’t agree with. So, I don’t know how much longer I will be a member, there either! As I get older, I feel less and less inclined to to put up with petty B.S. or politics.
However, it has been demonstrated enough to me that you get out of a club, what your willing to give to it!
Fair enough Chuck. It’s hard to read tone into a written message on a forum sometimes, and certainly some people certainly would be critical of a club that doesn’t just let them run whatever they want. (“prototype modelers are elitist, too strict, too many rules, taking all the fun out of it, etc.”) The placement of the parenthetical statement about a particular club only modelling SP right after the “heaven help the newcomer” line kind of gave a similar impression.
The way you describe the club in your clarifying message sounds a lot like my club. While we do have certain visual and accuracy goals as well, and wouldn’t exactly be open to a bunch of Tyco equipment, I like to think we’re a friendly, welcoming group. We recognize that not everyone necessarily shares our philosophy (there are a couple of other clubs in the area with more “relaxed”, for lack of a better word, approaches), anyone who is interested in what we’re doing is certainly welcome.
I am posting this in response to nickyb’s post about the Coastal Carolina Railroaders. I belong to that group and I am posting this for the president of the club.