Skip
Spot on, Steve, my point exactly! Andrea and
I are very fortunate ... we get to choose where we live. OK,
buying Neverland is out of the question, but we had/have a great
deal of choice. We chose where we are for many reasons. For me
to now complain and demand that I be allowed to violate rules I
knew about from the start is indeed "pretty selfish." I simply
adapted, and it's working great.
Having watched ARRL over close to 70 years flail in the FCC's
front yard over ill-advised and poorly crafted regulatory changes
[examples on request], I am *really* uneasy when the League enters
the Congressional arena. I doubt there has ever been a law or
statute enacted throughout human history that sounded like a great
deal at the time that turned out to have no undesirable
consequences. I sincerely hope ARRL chooses not to engage the HOA
lobby with an ARPA-2. It is what it is folks, get used to it and
adapt, one of our hallmarks of the past.
I do not have a horse in the DXCC race anymore [never really did,
actually]. I got my certificate for 107, after many years I'm up
to maybe 275 or so last time I looked at LoTW and the stack of
cards, but I'm not likely to submit them. That said, I offer a
warning to those for whom the award really matters: Beware of
tinkering with the rules. It is traditionally the first thing
that comes to everyone's minds, particularly those who believe the
rules treat them unfairly, witness this extended thread on DXCC
rules. The odds are low that a rules change will actually fix
anything. The odds are very high that a change will screw up more
than it fixes.
I note that there have been several posts here from teens and
young hams. What a day brightener that is!! Welcome to the
hobby! Adaptability may not be dead after all. [:=)
73,
Fred ["Skip"] K6DGW
Sparks NV DM09dn
Washoe County
On 8/6/2020 6:43 PM, Steven Rutledge
wrote:
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As far as the HOA issue goes.....I have moved seven times
through my career. I have never lived within an "HOA." How was
that? Well, I was a ham. I was familiar with antenna
restrictions and HOA primacy. Hams who have HOA problems can
only blame themselves. They choose to buy in a restricted
community, take the deed and agree to do everything that is laid
out to them. Then they get in the house and think that they can
change everything just for their own interests, everyone else be
damned. Pretty selfish I think.
There are plenty of places you can live in America that do not
have deed restrictions. If you choose to live in a neighborhood
that does, that is your choice. Its a free country, at least
right now.
73,
Steve, N4JQQ
On 8/6/2020 6:40 PM, Skip wrote:
Risking life and maybe limb ... I will
pick two nits with folks:
HOA's are not automatically demons. Please stop portraying
them as such. We sold "The Farm," where I had plenty of room
for antennas with no one to complain about them, to one of our
kids and spouse when age began to make maintenance difficult
or near impossible. We purposely bought our house here in
Sparks for its location, topography [flat lots, no icy hills
in winter, and closeness to shopping and major
streets/roads]. It is an appropriate distance from our local
son and his family. It is an HOA community with deed
CC&R's.
Our HOA and neighbors are benign and benevolent. No, I can't
have my 70' tower in the back yard, I had no expectation or
plan for that, and that's not the least bit unusual or
strange. I was adamantly opposed to ARRL's ARPA. Had it
become law, it would have changed our relationship with our
HOA dramatically, and for the worse. In return, my HOA could
have met its obligation to allow me "an effective outdoor
antenna" by allowing me to have an outdoor, 440 MHz 1/4 wave
ground plane. Our HOA maintains the common areas, internal
streets, and the rules assure that we'll have a pleasant
community to live out our lives. Please stop bashing them
generically as if they're all bad just because I can't put up
4 over 4 over 4 on 20 on a 120' tower.
I joined the W7RN crew and operate it remotely, it's about
40-45 km LOS from me, full power, very high Coefficient of
Aerial Aluminum, and very low man-made noise. I also have a
WOOF at home -- end-fed Wire On Organic Fence. If I ever have
need to call a roofing company, I'll have them install another
invisible wire going up the eave to the ridge, across to the
other side, and down that eave. W7RN remote and the WOOF
allow me to get as much hamming in as I desire.
My second nit is, "What ever happened to the adaptability of
hams?" So, let the flames begin
73,
Fred ["Skip"] K6DGW
Sparks NV DM09dn
Washoe County
On 8/6/2020 11:45 AM, w2ttt wrote:
W0MU,
We
are conflating a lot of important topics and I agree with
you on each of them. The original focus was on remote
stations. They are fine, but varied in character and use.
If the remote is my primary station and it's mine, that is
one case. Another is the rental remote. Again, fine but a
different case.
I
know guys who have cancelled their plans to retire to Maine
because of the remotes. If they were categorized
separately, the locals and the remotes would only compete
for bandwidth. A local has to address local conditions that
uniquely impact local operators. Sleep cycles, work and
worship hours, and weather can impact a local operator's
performance in ways that a remote operator may not have to
address. To be clear, both modes are good, just different.
On
the subject of getting youth on the air in an HOA, deed
restricted and zoning limited world of cookie-cutter homes
is simply frigjtening. You can't have certain vehicles in
some neighborhoods. I have a RAM Promaster with windows
all around, and because of the antennas, I get comments -
usually snarky. Well, we (Nancy, N2FWI and I) raised three
sons who are licensed Amateurs, Eagle Scouts and employed.
They too, are busy with getting careers moving, but there
may a time when life settles down and there is time to
operate.
I have neighbors who
don't like my truck, or my antennas, but their kids are
bored and barely going through life. We have a
cookie-cutter world and that is driving down creativity and
enabling this heightened level of narcissism as seen on the
Internet as a path to fulfillment. It started with
participation trophies and this is where we are now.
We
need to sort out what interests younger folks, even if it
will fit better once they hit 40 or 50. Our sons understand
why Dad has 100+ US Patents - they grew up around it and the
richness of life that God gave us that enabled that
intellectual property. The challenges are deeper than what
the ARRL can do by itself. It is a societal deficit that we
are trying to fix.
Vy
73,
Gordon
Beattie, W2TTT
201.314.6964
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