We live in an established neighborhood where folks are fairly friendly and neighbors walk and say hi. We just had a neighborhood evening event on our block to get to know neighbors as well as share info on emergency preparedness (A good idea for any neighborhood) and over 100 folks stopped by to connect and have a popsicle on a warm evening. My garden railroad goes partly through the front yard so I ran trains there as a novelty. Well it was a big draw and most folks wanted a full tour of the backyard trackage and basement layout. It was “National Night Out” so police and a fire truck with crew come and visit the neighbors. The firemen and paramedics saw the trains and had more fun with the Garden railroad than a bunch of cub scouts. They stayed the longest. “Big kids” with fire trucks. Think about inviting firemen to your next open house. You know the old saying about Kids not growing up, just the Toys get bigger. They want us to invite the station crew to out next Garden railroad tour. Add that to the list of potential interested folk. Watch for National Night Out opportunities in your neighborhood If you have a garden railroad that is amenable to neighborhood visitors. Good way to get to know folks when emergencies come up. Doesn’t work for everybody. Any other ideaS.

Warner Swarner, Portland, Oregon

Now that is a great idea!

I personally promote it myself every 3rd Thursday of June on Jubilee Day …have been for 10yrs now.

Sounds like a great tradition. Do you post notices or is it word of mouth? Are there other layouts in your area that run?

Over a decade ago I actually dropped into our neighbourhood firehall with one of my Aristo’ single dome tankers ‘under my arm’ because I could not confirm the proper warning placard that should be applied to the mounts.

http://aristodatabase.x10host.com/?prodid=41320&year=

We decided the generic options provided with the tanker, did not meet real world posting requirements Went with the closest though !

The fireman who did the most page flippin’, said this would/could be noted down as an official exercise for them

doug c

p.s. back then i was not promoting our annual “canada’s largest train show” as often as i do now, otherwise I would ah left them with a few of our free souvenir showguides . . . . . just in case

Warner Swarner said:

Sounds like a great tradition. Do you post notices or is it word of mouth? Are there other layouts in your area that run?

My house is just up the street on the right of Elvis impersonator with his body guard walking towards the stage just east of my garden RR

I usually hide on the back porch while running different train consists (Roundy Round with no operations) throughout the day. It’s the responsibility of the borough and the mothers/fathers to peel the children off my iron fence out front. During the day I will occasionally observe the front fence for enthralled children and families that seem respectful (unlike me) then invite them out back for a peek.

http://www.mechanicsburgchamber.org/event/jubilee-day/

Warner Swarner said:

Are there other layouts in your area that run?

Not sure if Charlie Zimmerman(aka CZ) runs on Jubliee Day or not? He is just outside of town and has an amazing Conrail OCS consist.