It's not so much the transportation network Chris, but rather the size. Europe and the East Coast of the US are about the same size, and with similar transportation systems. The distance from Portland, OR (biggest major city to Chris and I) to Legoland California (nearest major city being San Diego) is roughly the same as London to Rome. Chicago to Legoland is like Berlin to Cairo. It's just not practical for most in the West to drive to a con. And drive I must because of the demands of large MOC transportation. I suspect the latter sentence is true for most of us.wunztwice wrote:I would love to, but S. Cal. is just too far away for me at the present. Something in say Portland, OR. or Boise, ID, or even somewhere in Washington state is much more do-able for me, but probably not for others here. Unfortunately we don't have the transportation network Europe does to make it more affordable and such (I'm thinking trains specifically).
BrickCon (nee NWBC) is great for those of us in the Pacific Northwest, and it has brought out a huge amount of castlers as Josh points out. I think it's more of a "build it and they will come" (pun intended) situation where the great and consistent annual con has attracted a lot of us. We had one least one person from back east this last year. I imagine that a similar event in SoCal would do the same? Or any other similar hub-location, surely?
This website is the vehicle that allows us to gather, at least virtually, after all. That must suffice for most of us.
Richard