There is a similar situation in Calgary but its mostly associated around park-fliers who dont do RC stuff large enough to warrant joining a club......by chance many of these guys are also into indoor flying.

Well at our indoor venues (2-3 times a week usually) MAAC is mandatory (requested by the facility owners).....so many joined in order to fly indoor. Many of the guys who were not MAAC members at least now are, although they still dont belong to clubs. At least they are being exposed to those that do and gathering a better appreciation of all the hobby has to offer!

Now for the scary part Not sure how many of you are seriously into park flying....I do it a fair bit when schedule allows (usually early spring/later fall after competition season is over)....the ability of these models is incredible. We have guys here who are into the need for speed thing and get a lot out of their planes. I know of a one instance where they have been testing for speed in the local park (with one guys radar gun...you know where this is going)......hitting the 200 kph range IN A PARK! Sure enough the model failed and the bullet shaped fuse luckily was flying flat enough that it crashed within the park instead of the houses. Another popular model here "the Whiz" is quite easily capable of doing 100+ kph on 2s packs and cheap CD rom motors.....routinely flown in parks.

A lot of these guys have never belonged to clubs and have no experience with larger models so I dont know if they quite grasp the potential danger of some of the models they are flying.....I am involved as much as possible and try to pass along some sense of responsibility and it helps I think......but the issue is all of modelling will be painted with the same brush the day their is an accident at the local park (and I have no doubt there will be). With the surge of electrics and the huge increases in performance it wont be long before larger models start showing up in parks......it would be a peice of cake for me to fly my 10.5 lb Enigma (2.2 kW power system) at the larger parks and its so quiet no one would even know I am there.....realistically I have no need to belong to a club but I do because its the best place for it

There is such interest here in park flying that there will likely be a club formed soon and city permission requested (I imagine they will also require MAAC before they agree) to use certain parks for this activity.....on occasion we have had enough guys out at once to warrant setting up temporary flight lines and frequency control!!