Hi Guys,
Here's what I did to promote the hobby in general and S in
particular lately. Those who are familiar with the glacial pace at
which I usually work will be amazed to hear that I built a fully
functioning S scale layout in less than a week! Of course it only
has two turnouts and calling the scenery "minimal" would be extremely
polite (It doesn't even have ties!), but it did function to a useable
extent. I built it for "Science Fest", a day long presentation of
anything science related that the organizers can get folks out to
do. I found that I could get kids as young as five to shift cars
around using my NCE Power Cab. My sound equipped SHS 2-8-0 gave
audible warnings if they started out in the wrong direction.
Additionally they had fun ringing the bell and sounding the whistle.
Of course the directional lighting was a visual clue to the direction
the train would move. I had a few kids drive off the end of the
table before they figured out the time required to actually stop, but
since the table was only an inch and a half from the carpet no real
harm was done. A few of them asked how fast the train would go, but
everyone who played was happy to shift cars around on the three
tracks that make up the layout. No continuous running here! My
fears that the layout would be too small were unfounded. I would
have been fine with two cars. One father said, "Look Mike. They are
going to do some shunting." I said, "You must be Thomas fans. On
this side of the pond we call it switching." Just wait until you see
next year's layout! I'm planning an entire transportation network!
Maybe I'll even take pictures.
Jamie Bothwell
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