Quote:
Originally Posted by sdlynx
Okay folks, I'm going to vent for a bit.
I've been hoping to see some change in the group for some time. I've consistently attended Bay Area meets when I could. I've gathered folks from Central Valley, sometimes well, sometimes not so well.
What I've found is that there are a core group of people that really do love driving their cars and meeting other like-minded folks. People that will go out of their way to go to a meet-up. However, those people are few and far between here.
Living in the Central Valley, two hours from Dublin, I have made it to the monthly meet up quite a bit. However, with the exception of Finch, I've not seen a single bay area person make the same trek out to the valley for a meet up. Even our awesome ride through Yosemite with the Datsun Roadsters ended up only having five 86's
Yes, it's far. Yes, there a lot of folks even within the Valley that don't want to drive 1 hour from Fresno to Merced, or Modesto to Merced. Much less Modesto to Fresno or vice-versa.
I think that this separation of the group should be reflected in the tilting. Perhaps "NorCal 86" should encompass the larger group as it does now, and that group should be dissected into smaller groups. So, you'd have the larger NorCal 86. Divided to Bay Area, Sac/North, Central Valley. Then you can subdivide those groups as the Bay Area already has. East Bay, South Bay, Etc. Central Valley can divide into North Valley / South Valley.
Maybe we can see better inclusion, more activity in the currently inactive Central Valley, and hopefully less of the feeling of exclusivity from the Bay Area folks.
Just a thought...
I'll duck now, while the barrage comes...
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I believe this is already happening in a sense with the Facebook groups which seem to work better for smaller locals. The forum is just not as active it seems. Local areas run their own meets and Norcal86 is here for the big stuff (ToyDRIVE, Summer Kickoff, etc). None of the 3 Bay Area weekly meets, 2 Bay Area monthly meets, or Sacramento/Stockton monthly meet is organized or run by Norcal86.
I think the biggest problem you stated yourself, Fresno people aren't even willing to drive and hour to Merced. It is hard to get people to drive two hours if there is not a high likelyhood of a decent turnout on a consistant basis. The weather recently is definitely of no help. If we could get better turnouts locally in the southern Central Valley we could maybe get a Bi-monthly or quartly large meet in Modesto or Merced.
I also think that planning a Summer Drive would be a great idea. I know we are planning to get more sanctioned Drive events in the Sacramento area and up in the foothills. This would give people greater reason to get involved in 86Drive which is a little mroe Bay Area-centric due to road locations. But it takes people like you to plan these routes since nobody knows them. I would be good with working with you and the Sac group to plan some Central Valley star earning Drives to give more incentive to participate (with @
PMok's blessing of course). I currently have been trying to utilize social media better so maybe we can brainstorm sometime on how to help CenCal specifically.
A lot of this comes down to just setting a date and people will come, it's the talking about it constantly that drags it out and people lose interest.