It is working; however, it is the slowest of any of the web sites I visit on a routine basis. Still getting the occasional 504 Time Out error.
This may be why they were having website issues: Kalmbach just sold all their scale model and railroad magazines to another company: https://www.trains.com/trn/news-rev...magazines-trains-com-sold-to-firecrown-media/ Basically the end of an era. It sounds like the offices will still be based in Wisconsin, but this deal effectively kills Kalmbach as a company. After 90 years, it's all over. Hopefully this new brand can keep the magazines in publication. Model Railroader and Trains shaped the hobby for decades. It's hard to imagine what model railroading would be like without them.
Yup. I'm here because the MR site has become unusable and quite frankly, the final outcome is unclear. I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to post there again. There has been no "official" notification from their mods, Kalmbach itself, or anyone associated with the magazine or their online entity. I note that the new owners also publish Flying magazine. Flying does not appear to have an online forum, so perhaps they will just let the MR forum die. The only thing that flies around my train room is those Kadee coupler springs.
Today - May 5, 2024 I have only been able to get 504 Time Out's when attempting to access the Train's forum. Has Kalmbach turned off the electricity to the servers on their way out the door?
Reminds me of the billboard erected on I-5 south of Seattle when the Boeing SST was cancelled, "Will the last person leaving please turn out the lights", or something similar.
Haha! Reminds me of a story related to me by a friend who had friends within Conrail, that in the weeks following the NS/CSX carve up, numerous printers were left connected in empty offices at CR's Philly HQ. In darkened offices, the printers dutifully cranked away, churning out volumes of obsolete reports, piling up paper everywhere. I also remember that at the time, NS badly fumbled the critical Day 1 upload of CR's car location and waybill data, mistakenly using a test file. The result overwrote data and was irreversible. NS was left with a terrible and costly mess. I happened to find an old 01/17/2000 article on it at https://www.computerworld.com/article/1369969/merged-railroads-still-plagued-by-it-snafus.html Later, I heard that the error later resulted in at least one resignation of a senior IT manager.
Can't speak to anything ConRail did before or during the split. CSX shuts down their MainFrame computer every Sunday morning at 0045 for a normal hour and fifteen minutes to perform necessary software and hardware updates to the system. During the period of outage, the CADS sends train messages to on duty points vis 'CSX Technofax' which is TM data sent from CADS to the Technofax computer which faxes the data - untouched by human hands. The 'big' problem with this system happened when the telephone area code for a destination changed because of the expanding telephone systems across the country. When area codes were originated, then entire state of Maryland was in the 301 area code. When beepers appeared on the market the 410 area code was added - 301 covered the area around Washington DC and some areas along the Potomac River. 410 covered the Baltimore area and areas along the Pennsylvania State Line. When these area codes became near full, 240 and 443 were added as additional area codes and just recently the 667 area code was added statewide. Ever since the days of 301 & 410 came into existence Marylanders have had to dial the entire 10 digit phone number that includes area code for all in state calls. There is a saying - To err is human, to really foul things up humans need the assistance of a computer.
This is supposedly the billboard Hank references. (Source unknown.) I did happen. Seattle experienced a huge population loss during this time period, known by locals as "The Boeing Bust".
The old Kalmbach train forum sites have been unavailable now for two days. Occasionally the main General Discussion page will come up, but anything beyond that times out. Before the big purchase was announced, the site was down for five days. I'd like to be optimistic, but I doubt we'll ever see the site again.
My TRAINS subscription is good through the October issue. Since I usually have received multiple renewal requests before now, (I have had none) I doubt if TRAINS, perhaps other favorite Kalmbach railroading publications, will be continued in the form we have grown to love since our childhoods. Sad, but then again I no longer can compress my body to get in, or out of the three sport cars I've owned. So life goes on without me. I was told old age wouldn't be fun, but I didn't think it would come so soon.
I noticed on the Forum index page that all the magazine titles have been removed under the heading of 'Kalmbach Media' at the bottom left of the page.
Carstens Publications was sold to White River Productions in 2014 and both Railroad Model Craftsman and Railfan & Railroad have carried on with quality, but White River Productions was and remains railroad-centric. If Firecrown Media is to succeed, they best allow Kalmbach people to manage the railroad publications without interference. In reality though, we know how these things usually go. I wonder if WRP might attempt to poach select Kalmbach refugees?
Since Wrinn's passing and now the sale - I am not so sure the employees of the magazines are all that railroad industry oriented in either the 1:1 editions or the smaller scales.
If one pages down the firecrown site and uses the Trains button and page down through that display you eventually come toa 'Forums' button. When you click that button it takes you to the existing Trains Forum index page, which then times out into a 504 error when you tray to access it.
My subscription to Classic Trains is on auto-renewal and I'd like to pull the plug on that "feature" in case Firecrown Media ruins the publication. Actually, its content has been on a slow decline anyway. I tried to access my account today and it doesn't recognize me.
I reset my password at Kalmbach and was able to send a message that I wanted my Classic Trains subscription removed from auto-renewal. We'll see if I receive a response .......
Trains News Wire appears to be current. So it's being updated daily, either automatically or manually. Also Newswire still recognizes my log in. However, when I try to log into my Trains account, it doesn't recognize my account number, last name, or email address.
