01-28-2009, 03:59 PM
I think it has to do with what an individual wants to do. I think Frank Sinatra had his layout professionally built. I know other celebrities have hired pros to build layouts. On the other hand, I think Rod Stewart built his own layout. We have one member in our modular railroad club who built a module for another member. Some of us went over to help the guy with scenery and to check on the track work. Our standards call for every module to have a junction box with a 110 volt recepticle installed. The guy who had built the module had wired black wires to white wires and created a 110 volt direct short. This guy tries to do his own wiring and we do our best to keep him out of trouble, but he really ought to hire all electrical work done by a professional. As long as everybody is honest about whether a model railroad is the work of the owner, a club or friends helping him out, or a professional build, I don't have a problem with it. If having a professionally built layout is a criteria for appearing in the magazine, then I would consider that a problem. As it stands, when I used to subscribe to Model Railroader, or RMC as well for that matter, the featured layouts were a mix of professional builders and amateur modelers with probably 75% falling into the hobbyist catagory. My biggest complaint with Model Railroader has been and continues to be a lack of content that has application to my modeling interest. When you are modeling Southern California, there is almost nothing to be gained from articles on how to model New England or Wisconsin.