On Mon, 12 Mar 2007 18:52:14 GMT, "Ken Finney"
wrote:

The Puyallup hamfest was this past weekend (biggest hamfest in Washington
State). For the second year in a row, it seemed about the same size as the
year before. In previous years, it was shrinking about 20% a year or more.


7. The "talkin" repeater was pretty quiet. I think this is a bad sign for
future growth in ham radio.

I always enjoyed the Puyallup hamfest when we lived in Spokane.

It's hard to read the future of ham radio. I think it depends greatly
on how a community works to develop the hobby. Where I live in
northern Arizona, we have a lot of growth. We have been testing from
5 to 15 applicants at each VE session, and we have three sessions just
this month alone! And not just technicians. At our test session last
Friday we passed 3 new generals and 2 new extra class. Also our local
ham radio club is bigger than ever.

Much of this is due to very effective local training, frequent
demonstrations at places like art fairs, good leadership at our radio
club, and a very active ARES/RACES emergency communcation group. On
the other hand, I have also lived in communities that don't have these
things, and the ham population is stagnating or even decreasing. If
you want the hobby to grow, it takes work and dedication, but it is
still possible.

Dick - W6CCD




--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com