Oh no, Hattons are closing!!
I’ve always loved model railways, but the hobby has got increasingly expensive over the last 20 years or so. The high end has eaten the middle, and much as the details and fidelity of the models are now wonderful, the prices are absurd and the target demographic is retired boomers on final salary pensions. Combine that with the space constraints - 00 is the only gauge anywhere near being affordable and it requires 6’x4’ for a simple oval - and it’s a recipe for disaster.
Hornby are right to push TT, and personally I’d steer the industry heavily away from DCC and other expensive digital add-ons as defaults, as cool as they are. The right angle to push is that of unplugged creativity, not connected consumerism. Not good for profits in the short term, perhaps, but the hobby needs a new generation who dream of joining the local club and building their own large-scale layouts in retirement. If there’s no generationality then it’s over.
Me? My dream is simple now. Two-track garden railway loop along the fence with a few sidings and passing loops. I have neither the time nor the space to fully model anything, but I want to sit back and watch the trains go by anyway.
I’ve known and met exactly one person into model trains. Their entire basement was dedicated to their model train setup and wished for even more space. It was pretty awesome to watch the trains go but not awesome enough to ever want to get into the hobby.
I wanted a model train setup when I was younger, had a Bachmann N-scale set. There was a model railway store and toy museum in Virginia when I was a kid called “Mike’s Trainland”, and I used to go there and look at their setups.
I just don’t have the space or time for it now. But there are a couple of video games that let me scratch the itch.
People can afford hobbies???
Don’t do it. The train store is where they whacked Bobby.
Yeah, pretty accurate. Half the problem is most stuff with a 4’ by 8’ layout in mind. 18 or 22 inch radii, locomotives built for that, sceneray built for that. Who has that kind of space?
You also have the skyrocketing costs. Everything costs way more now.
At least Katos pocket line exists now, but still.