Is grassroots Irish model railway community sentiment truly reflected in online media?

z80CPU

Backdrop to my poll:

The modern rail society of Ireland is to wind down after 1st April.

Hatton's model railway store which sold to Irish customers not me sadly is closing for good.

Then also on Facebook,

I'm getting notices from an Irish dealer that things have never been better!

An article in the guardian newspaper about getting in newbies young to model trains is loudly promoted by Irish model railway. Also according to the article things in the model railway scene are fine generally ( in contrast to some Hatton's reasons for closing )

I vote 3 of course

coolwings

Putting a brave face in things

You describe noticing things with your own eyes that the online) media either ignore, or don't mention, or make an opposite case for.

And asked us. However, don't your own eyes give you the "most reliable" observation?

I think your observations are more likely to be correct than the article's contents. Actually, I pay very very little attention to "media" these days. Possibly I even invert what media says to see if that is more likely.

Here are some thoughts about your comments that just voting seemed too brief to discuss:

• the average age of model railway folks seems to be older than eg the shape of a population pyramid might suggest. (but maybe we get more into model rail as we age). SO I suspect for a long time model railway has interested fewer of the youth than other more flashy alternatives.
• Younger people spend a lot of time on social media, which takes directly from the spare time demanded by a "real" hobby, ie for learning over time , gaining skills, etc. SO practical skills are down and social skills are more invested in.
• disposable income ..... maybe houses have not risen in price as much as earnings have been suppressed. Looking at retail in general might be the "tell" for estimating this kind of thing.
• but really while money counts, a lot, the lack of people with skills for making anything, in my view, that's the knockout punch. A clue to verifying this might be to talk to many modellers you know. Their background is often technical, trade based, engineering, or similar. Too often to be random in my view, but musicians seem to bridge the gap between the can do and the can't kinds of people.
• Lastly, and this is a big one. The first model rail set used to be a small module of the same quality that makes a bigger model rail layout. So it lasted. It worked. It could be expanded. But plastic toy railway is different. it kinda sorta works, then wears out and breaks. People conclude: "I tried model railway it was temporary, and I'll move on looking for something else. " I really think buying cheap and wrong at the start makes that much difference.

coolwings

Putting a brave face in things

Add on .... in my reply above I neglected to mention the numbers of people playing online games.

Competition for user leisure time is fierce.

z80CPU

Not really.

Regarding musicians Heh.

My present track layout runs along where the players seat was by my disused thomann dop32 piano