Busy fingers and your layout

When I designed my layout, I looked at the layout table and the room, and decided to leave a space to lean on where people seem to stand to watch (they follow me as I go over to the control panel, but never seem to follow me around the corner without an invite). After crossing the gap, I have a single track with no switches, followed my a row of houses facing away. Anything beyond that is out of reach. I have had one or two people rest a hand on that track, and another guy pick up an engine I had sitting in that leaning area, but that's about it. Knock on wood

It's funny how some visitors to model train layouts think it's okay to touch anything.  After all, aren't they toys ?   

Last summer, we had a friend bring his young sons to see my garden railway.  Well, they are not that young, maybe 10 and 8 or so.   These kids, I knew from having been in their company before, proceeded to walk all over the railway, which is also my wife's garden.  I finally said something to the father to the effect that this is not a toy.  He was offended but didn't act on his offense.  I just stopped the trains and put them away.  End of problem.  I don't usually act in such a way, but from time to time, I get annoyed at peoples indifference to another's things.  Would you go into someone's house and proceed to stick your hands in their aquarium ?   Would you tear out stamps from a collection book ? 

I always try to enforce the policy of "Look with your eyes, and NOT your fingers!!!!!". 

Dan Padova posted:

 Would you go into someone's house and proceed to stick your hands in their aquarium ?   Would you tear out stamps from a collection book ? 

Uh oh, guess i wont stick my hand in my neighbors aquarium anymore....   (jk).

I only have train people visit my layout because lookers don't understand the time and money tied up in something that complex.

Mikey

I think that the "look and don't touch" mentality will ensure that this hobby dies much sooner. I think most of us can remember that part of the great memories from when we were kids was running locos so fast they flew off the curves, or putting plastic cows, lincoln logs or army men on the tracks causing derailments. We need to not take things too seriously or we risk never allowing children to build those memories that will allow nostalgia to bring them back to the hobby when they're older.

Jay in Ottawa

Jay Ottawa posted:

I think that the "look and don't touch" mentality will ensure that this hobby dies much sooner. I think most of us can remember that part of the great memories from when we were kids was running locos so fast they flew off the curves, or putting plastic cows, lincoln logs or army men on the tracks causing derailments. We need to not take things too seriously or we risk never allowing children to build those memories that will allow nostalgia to bring them back to the hobby when they're older.

Jay in Ottawa

Well to each his own opinion but, I strongly disagree.  What with all the "high end" model trains now available, the "hands off" policy is certainly appropriate. However, that said, we are certainly NOT talking about the "non scale" toy trains with track laid all over the floor, which are definitely made for "hands on playing with".

Having memories of what we may have done as kids usually was a train our parents bought on a loop of track on the living room floor.  Going to someone else home and letting your kid just have at the layout and not seeming to care about your property,time and money that went into it is plain ignorant!  Kids are kids but parents should know better! If they are my grand kids some day I'll let them run my layout with supervision but for now just my train friends and family if there interested. 

Our low level plexiglass on the modular layout seem to be an effective deterrent.......better than nothing .....

Peter

Penn-Pacific posted:

Dan Padova posted:

 Would you go into someone's house and proceed to stick your hands in their aquarium ?   Would you tear out stamps from a collection book ? 

Uh oh, guess i wont stick my hand in my neighbors aquarium anymore....   (jk).

There might be Piranhas lurking behind that rock....LOL

I agree that we cannot put bars on our railways, lest we alienate new comers to the hobby.  However, as someone pointed out, scale model railroads are for looking.  Toy trains can be a different matter.  Someone, like myself, who builds an operators layout, full of post war type accessories, will still get an ulcer if parents don't police their own children.  

"Train Sets", are for floor playing.  Just as when we were kids, the newer generation of children are going to want to crash the train.  But the trains we had as kids were bomb proof.   

Love the fact you put your policy in Germanglish.  You must know enough German to accomplish that so effectively!  Love it.

George

Rule is: keep hands on remote, not on trains.  This policy has been allowing my grandkids to run trains from time when they were two until the leave for college, leaving me alone at the throttle and wishing they were back.  

Methinks the answer is to have an oval of track and some cheap or discareded conventional stuff that the "kids", ages 1 to 93, can wreck to their hearts' content.  Those wishing to SEE the "adult" layout get a short course in keeping their hands in their pockets. 

ACHTUNG! (ditto whatever RRMAN wrote)!

Das est furshlugginer.

Dan Padova posted:

There might be Piranhas lurking behind that rock....LOL

That reminds me of a cat that had the same problem;

I have very short tolerance for parents who let their kids run wild around my layout, and some adults are just as bad.

Given that, I have an area just for kids under my layout where they can crawl trough a kid-sized tunnel portal and watch some trains from inside of the mountain. There are some old plastic trucks and tractors in there if they need to touch something.

I ask them if they want to see the inside of the mountain...the answer is almost always yes. I also let them know that only kids can go in there; no parents. They love it!

The parents can safely watch them from just outside the portal.

TJ

Re: small children.

Number 90 assisted the Lone Star HiRailers in hosting a "Day out with Thomas" in Grapevine, TX this past weekend.  I could not attend, so we talked on the phone for about an hour while he drove home, and the following is one of his conclusions in regard to showing trains to the public:

People want to see an "O-27 type" train set going REAL FAST around the track.  You are not going to impress anyone with a high level of detail, a realistic mix of road names in a wheel report, long consists, etc...they want a short train going full blast.

Within my family are many school teachers, both public and private schools.  On our get-togethers they recount the latest horror stories that have unfolded in their respective classrooms.  The common conclusion to all of it says that discipline within the home has fallen off a cliff. 

And the root meaning of discipline is not "to punish", but rather "to teach"  (disciple). 

These are things to bear in mind toward our society of young people.

Rob Leese posted:

 

People want to see an "O-27 type" train set going REAL FAST around the track.  You are not going to impress anyone with a high level of detail, a realistic mix of road names in a wheel report, long consists, etc...they want a short train going full blast.

 

A question, then: what engines have people found are the most stable when run at high speeds around curves?