Ideal place for a clubroom

[tamperman36]

Recently West Yorkshire fire service closed 2 fire stations around Dewsbury, having built a brand new station closer to the town center. The two old stations are now sat boarded up and awaiting a future, one site has a for sale sign on the other at Scout hill is just sat empty. It would make a fantastic location for a club with lots of space for layout construction, workshop and layout storage.It would slso be ideal for use for a small exhibition and model shop onsite.

Does anyone else have any thoughts on the idea

[peter220950]

Sounds great, but do you have  a Club that can afford premises like that?

 

The owners will doubtless want commercial rates, given the current economic constraints they work under, and without knowing more about it I would guess you would be looking at upwards of 25k pa to buy or rent, insure, pay rates, and heat and light the premises.

 

The model shop is also a difficult one, it's not exactly growth industry.

 

Nice idea but unless you have a rich benefactor I think it's more likely to become a housing site.

 

Peter

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

...Does anyone else have any thoughts on the idea

It is not a complete 'no-hoper' if there is potential for Lottery and other funding. This would be hard work to obtain, here's factors that swing these decisions, in no particular order.

 

A good quality building which the local authority and any other interested parties consider worthy of retention enabled by repurposing.

 

Local community need for a building in which as broad and inclusive a range as possible of activities can occur. (Not just a MRC base!)

 

Opportunities for skills training while the building is being repurposed.

 

Availability of other funding to support the repurposing and continuing use of the facility

 

Business plan to demonstrate the continuing viability of the operation after the repurposing phase.

[Enterprisingwestern]

WTF is "repurposing"

 

Mike.

[peter220950]

Any Lottery Funding I have been involved with still required 50% match funding, a mass of paperwork, and took a long time to get sorted. It also then requires the owners to sit on assets that they could sell while it's awaiting approval or otherwise. A big ask with their fiscal pressures.

 

Having jumped that hurdle you  still then need the rates, running costs etc covered on an annual basis by the business plan, so it's a bit chicken and egg, if you can afford to run premises like these, you probably have them already, if you can't you're less likely to get the funding. 

 

As suggested above the best hope is as a Community Project, but this then brings the downside that you don't have exclusive use of the premises, and are probably no better off than in Church Halls and the like.

 

Peter

[rue_d_etropal]

Our old firestation in Accrington has been unused for many years. There have been some potential buyers and some community based ideas but nothing has happened yet. Given how many empty buildings we have, some local people think owners are deliberately keeping them empty.

I have seen firestations converted into children's centres, but I suspect some worry about their locations as many were on busy roads, so have to be made secure.

To go the Lottery route for money, it would have to be a community based project, and a model railway club could be part of that. I do remember taking a club layout to Dewsbury many years ago, so assume there was a local club then.

 

I have suggested it for other projects, but a better way to see if there is any real interest is to start a crowdfunding project. That way if not enough people promise money then no money is wasted. A model shop could be included in such a project, possibly the first phase of such a project. Given how much many are prepared to spend on the hobby, putting in the price of a large loco each might raise enough money to get started. The best way then would be set up a co-operative to run the shop. There is a lot of good help provided by the cooperative movement, and cooperatives have been shown to be more successful  than other business models. 

 

Apart from some bigger(chain) model shops going out of business, it is actually rare for model shops to close unless someone is retiring. The problem is that to buy the business it needs a large amount of money, so no-one can afford to buy what might be a very successful model shop. Model shops need a steady flow of money, selling enough of what is popular(assuming they can get hold of those items). This is why I suggest crowdfunding and a co-op structure. It is also better to start with only a small shop, so it can be kept full. I used to run(or more like try to run) a model railway shop. Unfortunately the owners did not fully understand how much money they need to keep it running, so it did close down. I have also been involved in setting up a local co-operative, so have seen how that works. Crowdfunding is relatively new, but is proving a very good way to get projects up and running.

 

One thing I can add is that it is still probably easier setting up a model railway project, than a similar art and craft project, where people seem to expect someone else to fund it. Getting money out of artists is more like getting blood out of stone.