{"id":223198,"date":"2023-05-26T06:09:24","date_gmt":"2023-05-26T10:09:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brickmodelrailroader.com\/?p=223198"},"modified":"2023-05-26T06:09:29","modified_gmt":"2023-05-26T10:09:29","slug":"nlgm-worrstadt-what-happens-when-a-small-town-decides-to-have-a-big-lego-train-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brickmodelrailroader.com\/index.php\/2023\/05\/26\/nlgm-worrstadt-what-happens-when-a-small-town-decides-to-have-a-big-lego-train-show\/","title":{"rendered":"NLGM W\u00f6rrstadt – what happens when a small town decides to have a big Lego train show"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

NLGM means Noppenbahner L-Gauge Meeting and is organized by you guessed it, the Noppenbahner. It\u2019s hosted in the town of W\u00f6rrstadt, Germany, where the Lego event is now almost a yearly tradition. And that brings something unique into the event, something I haven\u2019t experienced before.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Noppenbahner are a group of German Lego train builders that build their models, just like most European builders, in scale 1:45. They have been around for a few years now and have built some of the most recognizable German trains in Lego. Including some TRAXX locomotives, a lot of German steam locomotives and diesel locomotives like the Baureihe 218. The individual members build their own layouts as well, which are mostly based on the MILS standard. These layouts can connect to both layouts from other Noppenbahner, and layouts built my members from other groups. Their members are based all across Germany, so they don\u2019t meet up on a regular basis. But they decided to turn one of their meetings into an event for similar minded builders and turn this into the NLGM event. 2022 was their first time hosting this event, 2023 was their second turn at it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They decided to host their event at W\u00f6rrstadt, which used to be a small sleepy suburb of Mainz and other big cities in the area but is now internationally known for its Lego event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 1 Nick form the Noppenbahner has built the W\u00f6rrstadt railway station in Lego, visitors who lived in W\u00f6rrstadt spent hours looking and recognizing all the details.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Why W\u00f6rrstadt?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Ahh W\u00f6rrstadt, the name alone brings back memories of a lot of visitors, having friends around, German BBQ at Saturday night and crashing your trains on a huge group layout. The reason why the Noppenbahner decided to host their event in W\u00f6rrstadt is quite simple.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nick lives in W\u00f6rrstadt since his forever basically, coming even to the point that he built the W\u00f6rrstadt train station out of Lego. As he knows the small town in and out, he was able to secure the towns venue, a beautifully restored town hall, for the event. Luckily for the Noppenbahner, the town of W\u00f6rrstadt really liked the idea of having a Lego train event there and supported them by giving them the keys to the location for affordable conditions. The major also gave a short speech to open the event both years. \u00a0The even included the town symbol of W\u00f6rrstadt in their 1×6 sand red event brick at the 2023 event. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 2 the mayor giving his speech during the 2022 event. As you might noticed the author of this article isn’t in this picture ;).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Like mentioned before, the 2023 version was the second time the Noppenbahner organized this event and it was again organized on the last weekend of April. Before we get to much into the event itself and all the cool Lego stuff, there is something else I would like to point out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Visitors.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I have been to quite a lot of events\/conventions in the last six years. As far as I can remember there aren\u2019t any events that I have done where I wasn\u2019t satisfied with at the end of the weekend. But one thing always stands outs to me at events, and that is the reaction and behavior of visitors. Don\u2019t get me wrong I\u2019m not a creep who likes to stalk all the visitors and observe them (maybe.).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Visitors always bring a certain atmosphere to an event. Your goal is always to impress them and give them their \u201cmoney worths\u201d. There is nothing cooler than having a group of visitors around that are interested in what you do as a hobby, ask in depth or interesting questions and most importantly enjoy your exhibit. There have been so many events around where I was able to meet other builders who like to learn from us or want to check out our stuff in real life. Their where times where I missed a large portion of an event because I was just talking with visitors for most of the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A good example of this was a model railway event I attended with the LLMTC early this year, so many of the \u201cnormal\u201d model railway builders were asking in depth and interesting question and where really keen on learning what we do. And they just loved recognizing all the details we have built into our models.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, an uninterested group of visitors can really turn an event down. I have been at events where the visitors where just not interested. I have been at a event where the number of stands where you were able to buy Lego outweigh the amount of MOCs that were on display. This made most of the audience\/visitor\u2019s keener on a bargain than seeing interesting MOCs. A \u201cchildren\u201d event like LegoWorld attracts more visitors which aren\u2019t interested in MOCs but just want to play and built with Lego at the event itself, the consequences of this is that you have a audience of visitors which ask more questions like \u201c\u201d why isn\u2019t that train running?\u201d instead of being interested on how that train is made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luckily, I can say that the visitors at the NLGM in W\u00f6rrstadt belong to some of the most kind, interested and well-behaved visitors I have ever experienced. The amount of question and interest in us was overwhelming, it\u2019s also turning in something well known in both the area of W\u00f6rrstadt and Germany itself. Some visitors travelled very far just to visit this event. The car park was so full that people decided to use the nearby basketball field to park their car. And visitors are now calling it a yearly tradition, where even the elders in the village asked if the event is really going to happen again next year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 3 one of the visitors\u2019 favorite layouts was Holger Matthes his bridge.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Beside visitors travelling far, befriended builders from across Germany travel to see this event and hang out and talk to us. Something that I can say is very unique to see in a field of MOC building that isn\u2019t that very big or well-known compared to others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the things that stood out at the event was how well behaved and polite the visitors where (might have to do with the fact that they are German). There were some area\u2019s that visitors weren\u2019t allowed to walk through or enter. I have experienced at other events that we had to uses gates (sometimes even riot gates) to prevent people to enter these areas, with visitors still ignoring the gates. But in W\u00f6rrstadt, a simple sign on a piece of paper that said (in German of course) that visitors weren\u2019t allowed to enter was more than enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 4 normally I would be really scared having my models this close to the edge of the table<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

2022 event.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Back to some Lego stuff. The 2022 event was held on the 30th<\/sup> of April until the 1st<\/sup> of May. Back when covid was still a thing and it was mandatory to wear a coffee filter on your face in Germany, me and six other members from the LLMTC decided to travel to W\u00f6rrstadt. The principle of W\u00f6rrstadt is very similar to what other events like the event at Schkeuditz maintain, they create the possibility for builders to create a layout at home to a modular standard of their choice and bring it to the event. Where the organizers try to get as much different layouts possible connected to each other to form one huge group layout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 5 an overhead look of the 2022 set-up in the main room, a large section isn\u2019t visible since it was underneath the platform where I took this picture from.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The running\/layout style of this event is point to point. Which means your train is able to start at point A on the layout (most likely a storage yard), travel through the entire layout to point B, where it can use the return loop, or you can choose to park it inside of this yard. This makes running trains way more interesting compared to a tradition loop layout. The play factor in setting up layouts like these is way higher compared to having your trains running on the same circle at the entire event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 6 back in 2022 the second room had Thomas\/TS_ his yard in it, here I was dropping of some coaches and picking up some others to take back into the main room.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

So, the 2022 event, what was so special? Well, the number of layouts was so immense that they used a second smaller room to display some extra layouts. Your trains literally had to go through a walkway from the main room to the second room, a concept that adds a lot to the point-to-point driving experience. What was also very unique is that the main yard was on stage in the main room. This meant that trains which were not in use, where parked on a higher level, perfect height for visitors to look at the models.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 7 Inside the yard from Thomas\/TS_ was also a turntable which was perfect for turning locos to send them back into the main room.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There was a large number of interesting layouts, too much to list up in this article, therefore I highly recommend checking out Ties\u2019 video of the event which has 20+ minutes of amazing video shots of our models running around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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