What year did you discover the online road community?

[formulanone]

I found the MTR FAQ around 2003-2004, read it for about ten minutes, wasn't terribly interested in what was said in the discussions at the time...but I kept coming back to the FAQ and a few other static websites pretty much around 2000 or so. Mainly, I didn't care much on a nationwide level except for what was going on in Florida, and a few curiosities elsewhere.

I kept finding myself coming back to AARoads so much on various searches from 2008 and onwards, that I figured I finally ought to join, back in early-2011. By that point, I started traveling a lot more, and was more interested in transportation particulars away from home. I still feel like a n00b when it comes to much of this.

Still haven't done a meet, though...I'm away from my family so much that my weekends are mostly their property, so chances and opportunities for that are rare.

I do remember Kurumi's site and James Lin's page - the latter one when one day I'd wondered what other states' road markers looked,like. Probably some others I can't remember...something called "wasteoffilm.org" also springs to mind; and also made me realize I wasn't the only one taking photographs of signs. Wikipedia had, and still is, an informative way to learn about it.

[vdeane]

Sometime in 2004 or 2005; someone posted a sign photo to Simtropolis, and in my resulting Google image search for road signs, Upstate NY Roads appeared in the search results.

[hbelkins]

1995 or 96.

[Zeffy]

When did I join? Because that's when. I'm thinking either 2012 or 2013. Can't remember. I honestly can't remember what I was searching for when I found this forum either. I think it was something on making road signs... yeah it probably was, because I landed in the Road Related Illustrations topic.

[hotdogPi]

When did I join? Because that's when. I'm thinking either 2012 or 2013. Can't remember. I honestly can't remember what I was searching for when I found this forum either. I think it was something on making road signs... yeah it probably was, because I landed in the Road Related Illustrations topic.

Very beginning of 2013.

[xcellntbuy]

I do not know what year it was, but I was incredibly amazed that anyone, anywhere had any interest in roads, signs, maps and so on. 

In many ways, I am still truly amazed.  The number of folks who frequent this forum and have expansive websites and staggering amounts of knowledge, understanding and the history of roads is incredible.

On the side, I am a very big fan of road videos.  Road videos not only introduced me to places I have never been but, a whole other music genre--trance--that I had never heard of or experienced beforehand.  Often I will watch a host of road videos at home just for their music while I work on my other hobbies. 

[sammi]

When did I join? Because that's when. I'm thinking either 2012 or 2013. Can't remember.

You know you could check your profile...?

[Zeffy]

You know you could check your profile...?

I'm too lazy today to do that. 

[froggie]

Discovered that MnDOT had a website in 1996.  Discovered Andy's old Highway Kickoff Page in late 1997.  First posted to MTR sometime in 1998.

[jeffandnicole]

Somewhere around 2000 or a few years after that, I discovered MTR.  I was late in the game getting to this site...I guess I just never came across it somehow in my web searches.

I did a quick google search, and it appears I was active in MTR in 1999.

[US71]

I don't have time to look right now.

[golden eagle]

Here, in 2009.

[amroad17]

I came upon this site around 2004 as well as a few others such as Upstate NY Roads, kurumi's 3di site, and Froggie's site.  I lurked for eight years before deciding to join this site in 2012.

[cpzilliacus]

Usenet, in the late 1990's. 

Here, only a few years ago.

[empirestate]

'97 or '98 for me. I'm quite sure the first site I found was James Lin's, when I had the brilliant idea that I could search the web for "state highway sign shapes" (using Lycos, of course). Thereafter, I came across zzyzx, kurumi, Steve Anderson's and J.P.'s sites, and so on, and it wasn't long before I figured out what m.t.r. was and how to use it.

[Henry]

2000, shortly after I had moved to Seattle. I was a longtime lurker on M.T.R, but never got to post anything there; I just loved to read the many ideas and rants on it. Then came the various road-related websites, and finally, the AARoads Forum.

[hbelkins]

When did this forum start, anyway?

[vdeane]

I'm guessing early 2009, since that's my join date and I'm pretty sure I joined when it was first announced on MTR.

[Alex]

When did this forum start, anyway?

January 15, 2009.

[getemngo]

When did this forum start, anyway?

January 15, 2009.

For extra fun, check out the join date for Alps or bugo.

[Duke87]

I remember being in middle school when my mother told me there was a website that had lists of all the exits off of various highways. I have always had a thing for making lists, so combine that with roads and she might as well have told me she had found a magic candy store for me to go play in. This would have been in 1999 or 2000, I don't remember exactly. All I remember is that I spent a lot of time in those days reading NYCRoads and its sister sites as they went online, along with Kurumi's site, this site, Empire State Roads, and various other pages that got linked to.

But, aside from writing an email to Kurumi in 2001 or so to report the existence of a couple of error US 15 shields near the Merritt Parkway, I had zero interaction with any people in the community prior to joining this forum in January 2009. MTR always struck me as intimidating and I was never comfortable attempting to jump into it.

Which is just as well, since if I had gotten involved with the community back when I first discovered it, people would have gotten to know me as an annoying autistic kid rather than as a mature adult, and I probably would not have made friends the same way. So it's all worked out for the best!

[sdmichael]

I found MTR around 1996 or so, I think. I put my website up in 1995.

[TCN7JM]

I think the first time I encountered this site in particular was as an outsider four or five years ago. I remember I was looking up a road picture to set as my computer background, and I distinctly remember this site because clicking "View images" on any AARoads pictures would give me a 403.

I started to minorly contribute to the U.S. Roads project on Wikipedia in summer 2012, and became more active in October of the same year. I didn't join this site until last summer, and this is the first real road community I have been a part of.

[hbelkins]

When did this forum start, anyway?

January 15, 2009.

Hmmm. I joined three days later. For some reason, I thought that the forum had been in existence for a long time before I joined, and I just hadn't heard about it for some reason or another. Knowing this actually makes me feel better.

I don't remember where I heard about it, whether it was on MTR, Roadgeek, or if someone told me privately.

[hm insulators]

Here, in 2009.

Same here, and when Truvelo in Birmingham, England joined about the same time, it puzzled me as to why somebody in Birmingham, England would have an avatar picturing a street sign in Phoenix, Arizona, just blocks from my house. After we exchanged a few PMs on the matter, it turned out that Truvelo is also a fellow insulator collector who had come to Arizona for a visit to an insulator show (those are akin to, say, baseball card shows or record shows) and came to my house to see my collection. A strange coincidence indeed.