Central Ohio/Columbus road meet.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

Cabin fever must be getting to many of us with the proliferation of road meet threads this week.  
I'm organizing a get-together for here in Columbus. Recent tradition has been to hold the Ohio roadmeet in May. However my schedule only allows for the weekend of May 14 or 21 (I have another activity for for May 7 and May 28 being Memorial Day weekend).
An alternative idea has been suggested by Brian Reynolds. He noted that the Roadmap Collectors Association is having their yearly map-swap in June (24 & 25) in conjunction with the yearly International Petroliana Collectors Convention (aka Check the Oil) in suburban C-bus (Dublin, in NW Columbus to be exact)
(website for Check the Oil: http://www.checktheoilmagazine.com/pages/Annual%20Show.html)

So I have two questions.
Would folks be more interested in meeting in May (lunch, chat, tour) or in June (chat, shop, maybe a short tour)?
Iregardless of whenever we meet, which "sites" in Columbus and the surounding counties would you be interested in seeing?

About the only slam dunk we must see site I have so far would be the I-270-Oh 161-Sunbury Rd interchange.
(Satalite view: http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=40.081486,-82.907252&spn=0.015466,0.05476&t=h&z=15)
I too would like to incorporate the restaurant, Roadhouse 66 as a meeting point. The owner is a big US 66 fan and has plenty of roadgeek material inside.
After that what would folks want to see? Maps? Interchanges? Bridges? Road signs? Unique commercial entities/art? Historic sites?
What would make you interested in coming to Columbus (or for the locals, to get you out of your house)?

Thanks.

[Alps]

I've seen very little in Columbus. So for me, I'd rather see a meet with a full tour than an abbreviated one if I'm going to be drawn out there. Now I am planning a meet in Quebec for Memorial Day weekend so I would vote the 14th over the 21st, but either option would work in theory. I like button copy and my opinion on meets is that there should be something new, something old (abandoned even), something photo worthy like a bridge, something unique like a special sign. If you can get all four of those elements in, you win.

[froggie]

If I were to make it out, doing it in June to coincide with the RMCA map-swap would be the preferred choice.

[hbelkins]

Dan usually plans something in Ohio for May. Is he collaborating on this or conceding planning of a 2011 Ohio meet?

Columbus is such an easy drive that unless I had something else planned, I could probably make any date.

I am considering -- make that seriously leaning toward -- doing my biennial meet in the Huntington/Chesapeake/Ashland area this year (as opposed to the other options I'd considered, Bowling Green or Hopkinsville/LBL), and I would do it in May or June, so my date would defer to yours since these meets would be in relatively close proximity to one another.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

Dan usually plans something in Ohio for May. Is he collaborating on this or conceding planning of a 2011 Ohio meet?

Ask him. Dan and I have traded emails concerning a Columbus meet, but I speak for Dan as much as I speak for you.

Columbus is such an easy drive that unless I had something else planned, I could probably make any date.

I am considering -- make that seriously leaning toward -- doing my biennial meet in the Huntington/Chesapeake/Ashland area this year (as opposed to the other options I'd considered, Bowling Green or Hopkinsville/LBL), and I would do it in May or June, so my date would defer to yours since these meets would be in relatively close proximity to one another.

It'll all come together shortly.

[hbelkins]

Dan usually plans something in Ohio for May. Is he collaborating on this or conceding planning of a 2011 Ohio meet?

Ask him. Dan and I have traded emails concerning a Columbus meet, but I speak for Dan as much as I speak for you.

Reason I asked was that I was wondering if there are going to be two Ohio meets this spring/early summer. If you're doing this one and Dan's thinking about doing one, that'd be two Buckeye meets for a couple of our more prominent Ohio haters not to attend. 

[DanTheMan414]

As Sandor alluded to, we've been e-mailing back and forth about this, so we're all on the same page.   Columbus is the place to be for this year's Ohio Roads Meet.  Richard Ruffner noted that work on I-75 in downtown Dayton probably won't be complete until later this year, so a Dayton meet would be more viable in 2012. 

As for a date, either Saturday 5/14 or 6/25 during the RCMA conference looks good here.   

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

More as a courtesy to Ritchie, H.B., and anyone else scheduling a roadmeet for this spring, I'm setting the date for the Columbus meet as Saturday, May 14.

[hbelkins]

I will be tentative for that one, but it's likely I will attend since it's an easy drive.

And that also means that if I do a meet in the Huntington/Ashland area, it would be late June so as to put a little time between two meets in relatively close proximity to each other.

[6a]

I've seen very little in Columbus. So for me, I'd rather see a meet with a full tour than an abbreviated one if I'm going to be drawn out there. Now I am planning a meet in Quebec for Memorial Day weekend so I would vote the 14th over the 21st, but either option would work in theory. I like button copy and my opinion on meets is that there should be something new, something old (abandoned even), something photo worthy like a bridge, something unique like a special sign. If you can get all four of those elements in, you win.

There's the aforementioned 270/161 for something new, a new bridge downtown that is quite a looker (and another in progress right next to it), and I'm sure we can figure something out to nail the other two criteria.

[ctsignguy]

i would be interested but May 14th is a bad day as i am attending the 3rd Annual N-scale Gathering that day

[Ian]

I'll be in Ohio on the 14th, but for different purposes 

[hbelkins]

Nothing against the fine people who will be assembled in Columbus on the 14th, but I am opting for the Kansas meet to be held the same day. Columbus offers nothing new in the way of highway clinching potential or new counties, while the Kansas meet offers those in abundance.

If the Kansas trip falls through I will probably come to Columbus, but as for now I'm out.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

Trying out the mapshare feature from Delormes.
link below should show you my proposed itenerary for the Columbus meet (though the DT Columbus portion is hard to read on this)
http://mapshare.delorme.com/Consumer/V.aspx?p=6x37zr3k

[froggie]

What's the feature heading a ways east on I-70?

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

What's the feature heading a ways east on I-70?

Out east? That would be the "abandoned" section of (temp) I-70 along Oh 158 between US 40 & I-70 along the western edge of Kirkersville

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

If any of you attending the Columbus meet have access to the Ohio State (Univ) library, please contact me.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

With 11 day till the Ohio meet (or regata if the rain doesn't stop).
Please let me know through this weekend if you're attending (next weekend)so I can tell the owner.
For anyone unfamiliar, we're meeting for lunch at Roadhouse 66 (480 E. Wilson Bridge Road, Worthington)
Road tour afterwards --
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&msid=211323718039060739946.00049f53867b71fc28382&ll=40.089629,-82.931671&spn=0.501141,1.231842&t=h&z=10

Some of those stops might be left off the actual tour due to our weather (last 2 months)

[Alps]

I'm still a go as long as I can get my work in. Do you have a route planned yet? Would like to modify my own planned route to avoid overlaps.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

I'm still a go as long as I can get my work in. Do you have a route planned yet? Would like to modify my own planned route to avoid overlaps.

I have two routes thought out, depending on the weather. More rain we get here in Columbus, the shorter the tour will become.

[Alps]

As long as it's not raining on Saturday, just make the tour nice and long. I'll bring rain boots.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

As long as it's not raining on Saturday, just make the tour nice and long. I'll bring rain boots.

I'm more concern with mud at US 40/Oh 158 (Kirkersville) and river level for the Big Darby Creek in regards to viewing the National Road and Beach Road bridges beneith them.

[Alps]

As long as it's not raining on Saturday, just make the tour nice and long. I'll bring rain boots.

I'm more concern with mud at US 40/Oh 158 (Kirkersville) and river level for the Big Darby Creek in regards to viewing the National Road and Beach Road bridges beneith them.

Any chance you or someone else in the C-bus area could scout them out either Friday or Saturday morning and see if they're meet-worthy? I would think if you can see the bridge at all, even through a foot of water, it'd be worth a look.

[DanTheMan414]

Gee, what a surprise, given what Midwest weather has been like the last several weeks...the forecast for Columbus 8 days before the meet: Chance of showers, high of 64 F.  Whatever the case, it should be better than the meet there in July 2005.  The tour got halted for 1/2 hour in a McDonald's parking lot as a result of a strong monsoon-like rainstorm that overtook the area.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

About the only change in the forecast here for Saturday is temps in the upper 60s now, but still a 50/50 chance of rain.
If any of you (especially in Central Ohio) are still interested in attending, speak up now. The roof at Roadhouse 66 does NOT leak. and there will be some form of tour, no matter what the conditions are Saturday afternoon.