Fairhope, Alabama, 16th annual train show, March 15 - 16

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
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SWARM (South West Alabama Railroad Modelers) will hold its 16th annual train show during the Fairhope Arts & Crafts Festival, Saturday and Sunday, March 15 - 16. The show will be at the Fairhope Kindergarten-First Grade Center at 100 S. Church Street, a block south of the A&C Festival that draws about 250,000 visitors during their three-day weekend. Fairhope is on the Eastern Shore of Mobile Bay on U. S. 98 south of the I-10 Daphne exit.

There will be two O-gauge layouts in the school cafeteria, along with two HO, two N and one Z layout. The O-gauge layouts are SWARM, about 15 x 21 feet with a double-track main line of Lionel FasTrack, and Bay Area Rail Roaders, about 16 x 25 feet with a triple-track main line of AtlasO track. The Emerald Coast Garden Railroad Club of Milton, Florida, will welcome visitors with their large layout set up in the school’s front yard. The Mobile Society of Model Engineers will bring one of the HO layouts. The Pensacola Model Railroad Club will bring HO, N and Z scale layouts, and there will be a N scale layout from Fort Walton Beach.

The main building and gymnasium will feature S&W Parts Supply from Metairie with 12 tables (mostly O including trains and parts), Trains by Johnson from Pensacola with 12 tables (assorted but often with a lot of O), Harley Rabig from New Orleans with 12 tables (mostly HO and N), Hummingbird Hobbies from Gulfport with 12 tables (mostly HO and N), Dan Sheppard from Jay, Florida with 5 tables (mostly used Lionel). There will be several smaller vendors including the Foley Alabama Railroad Museum, selling donated items that do not fit into their operations, and there will also be railroad-related merchandise including videos. As of March 2, 85 tables have been reserved.

There will also be a display of very detailed scratch built N-scale dioramas by Tom Klouzal, a display of scratch built 2-rail O and HO models by Gary Gealy, and a display and demon

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Cool! Do you know how far that is from Florence or Huntsville?

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Fairhope is on the eastern shore of Mobile Bay and is about 400 miles from Florence and Huntsville. Take I-65 through Birmingham and Montgomery to the Bay Minette/Gulf Shores exit, then AL 59 to US 31 to Spanish Fort, and US 98 to Fairhope. You’ll want to spend the night someplace. Remember, with some 250,000 people coming for the Arts & Crafts Festival it will pay to get motel reservations in advance.

While here there are plenty of things to see – Battleship Park, a very large HO layout at the ACMR Train Store in downtown Mobile (open Thursday through Saturday, located at intersection of Claiborne and St. Francis, 2nd floor of old Shrine Temple), and a large O layout in Foley (they run trains Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday from 10 to 2, located at depot at intersection of 59 and 98). Next door in Pensacola there’s the National Museum of Naval Aviation, worth the trip even if you didn’t see any trains! Oh, there’s also the Arts & Crafts Festival and the Outdoor Art Festival on the streets of Fairhope, March 14 - 16![:)]