Crewe Area Group
While Crewe is clearly the right place to have such a thing, the Crewe Area Group (CAG) is in practice broadly centred on south east Cheshire, which certainly contains Crewe, but our current active membership of fourteen is spread as far south as Whitchurch and Stoke on Trent and as far north as Stockport. Our members are all active P4 modellers: they include a few representatives of the trade, a few S4 Society luminaries and even the odd body who is both at once.
Our Area Group meetings are at a member's house, normally on the afternoon of the second Sunday of each month. The meetings are usually themed, that is we ask one of our members to pass on the fruits of their hard earned wisdom, but we're not beyond going visiting instead. Over the last year or so we have had such delights as:
- A workshop on painting and lining given by a professional modeller,
- A good flick through our Stores Officer's amassing photo collection,
- An opportunity near Christmas to eat mince pies and play trains,
- A fascinating day operating John Brighton's layout 'Millhouses',
- A visit to Don Rowland's well known Central Cheshire line and
- Our annual dinner in the Crewe Arms Hotel where it is possible to eat dinner and watch trains navigate Crewe North Junction.
The Group produced an 18.83 Layout Challenge entry, Knutsford East Junction and following our successful appearance at the 2005 Scaleforum, we now have a regular supply of exhibition invites and we continue to develop the layout; the most recent addition being a new board containing part of a military establishment.
We try to keep Knutsford East's show appearances down to two a year. For those who haven't come across the layout try the 'layout of the month' in October 07 Railway Modeller.
So there you have it, this is an active area group which in some ways operates like a normal club. It is unapologetically P4 and is a friendly place to get fired up about modelling properly in 4mm scale. If anybody would like to join us, we would make you very welcome.
Please contact our Area Group Organizer David Burton, details on the Blue Sheet.
Some of the usual suspects behind the layout at the Manchester Show last October.
From left to right: Phil Bourne, Dick Petter, Tony Montgomery, Will Litchfield and Tony Walker
Blue Sheet