I don't believe that would 'fly' Jim, commercially or popularly. You have of course accurately identified that ease of participation is notable part of the reason in that today I can buy a 4 channel TX suitable for a PF complete with nicad for about the same as the cost of decent handle and set of stainless lines, and it's easier to source! But the primary reason such a concept hasn't a hope of succeeding is that it simply lacks sufficient "kuuuLe!" factor to attract a socially and materially indulged individualistic and unrestrained generation of kids amongst a plethora of alternative, affordable, easier to aquire kuuULr offerings.

Being completely honest with ourselves, if R/C had been as affordable and accessible in our day as it is today, would we have spent 30 seconds even thinking about playing with C/L or Free Flight? The honest anwser for all but the extraordinary few is an emphatic "No!". I know I certainly gave the concept of free flight short shrift the moment I could afford control line. For me free flight never proceeeded beyond paper and simple balsa gliders followed by a magnificent rubber band powered Guillow's Nieuport 17 (or was it a Biggles inspired Camel?) because it was only an enforced alternative until I could afford C/L and manage it without adult assistance or mentoring in an age when if we wanted something we had to acquire the means to afford and action it inedpendently. And the reason we did C/L instead of R/C was because either there simply was no alternative at all at the time, in that R/C was in its infancy which was beyond our means either technically or materially. Once it wasn't, look what happened. Mass migration, except amongst true afficionado with resistance and negativity generally attributable to obstinacy of those simply resentful and resistant of change. We have our appreciation of C/L through the experience, enhanced by nostalgia.

Hey, I'm not knocking C/L. I love it as I've iterated elsewhere. I recognise not only its limitations but its strengths. But that said, it is as much a part of yesteryear and nostalgia as majestic ocean liners are to intercontinental travel, the piston engined airliner is to commercial aviation, or the magnificence of steam is to contemporary commuter rail services. Social re-engineering including the hours and pressures of the contemporary work environment and 'nuclear family' is much to blame with the patient pursuit of a hobby superseded by demand for entertainment providing immediate gratification and constant tittilation.

Even conventional R/C is playing the price of competing with the ease, access and fascination of the PC. As I perceive the immediate interim future, R/C will remain the dominant form of aeromodelling though affected by technical and voguish change. Frequency congestion will be reduced through the increasing contribution of the microchip to synthesization and ever narrower band op and anti-interference technologies enhancing safety, all of course subservient to inevitible PE. Much though I abhor it personally, similarly with its technical advance electric flight will become increasingly dominant over IC as it has clearly re-excited and captured the imagination of that portion of today's generation still remotely interested in model flight - and retailers. Part of this revitalisation revolution has been down to the proliferation of packaged electric park flyers which has made having a go as accessible as C/L was to us in our childhood as it certainly to me and my mates - and the gang which would turn up to watch when they heard the engine fire up. Though that has a finite life before public pressure will relegate the activity to club sites. I predict that along with the current 3D fad, they will be become the new core of the R/C flight generation, and the same personality types as zealous in advocation of their interests as those in ours are of ours.

In 20-30 years once those of us to whom it was once of some significance have all passed, other than the quaint pastime of a couple of the curious or 'collectors' if at all, C/L will exist with no more significance than the pressed and painted metal wind up clockwork train and race car running its tin track of the 30's does today. Superceded by the massively popular Scalextric slot car in the '60s, they too have since been largely relegated to relative obsolecsence by Tamiya electric and IC R/C in this age.

If I could offer u-control aka control-line an epitaph, like the Spitfire or Mustang, glorious they may still be, but of another time and zenith never to be again.