peterab

As soon as I saw the cheerleader I thought she was an M-tron fan :-) I can see a good use for M-tron torsos in my town.

The Santa Fe cars were available in Australia at normal retail stores, so I would guess they were available in other larger markets also. They were well designed sets, they went along with a very popular engine. They _did not_ sell well. After the initial stock they dissapeared from retailers, I guess because the retailers didnt want to stock slow selling items. In fact they sat around in stock on S@H for 3 years untill they were put on sale for $20. I'm not sure TLG is interested in the niche hobby stores. The difficulty and cost of stocking them would probably eat any profit margin on trains. Since they have less customers than the big retailers their sales are probably also less. Also many of their customers view lego as toys not models

It was posted some time ago, but it does look awesome.

Well, mines not in storage, I just haven't ridden it in months. I must admit all the excitement here is tempting me though. Be really careful, and avoid over confidence. Your risks are highest just after buying a new bike, since it will handle slightly differently to any other bike you've had before, and your reactions may be tuned to a different bike and may be inappropriate for the new one. Have fun with your new bike, it looks an awesome beast.

Or they could use this one they already have. Look at the colours on the wanted lists, we are not the only ones to have thought of this idea.

I mainly buy the modulars because they are very good value parts packs, as I think in Lego Train Club circles they get way over used as models. After CC was released it seemed every train club included it on their layouts, so I made the descision I'd like to be able to build to that standard, without using official sets. (So far I haven't :-) This colours my ranking of all the modulars. 1. Grand Emporium. Has a huge ammount of one of the most useful (though no longer rare) colours; tan. Many, many windows in a rare colour, tan baseplate, and lots of civilian minifigs. Also some uniquie dome pieces, and new POP arch bricks. I also love the architechture of the model and will probably borrow techniques heavily, or perhaps even just slightly mod it for my own layout. 2. Fire Brigade. Great coloured bricks. Lots of useful light bley, and rare dark red. Also many windows and dark tan. I like the model but it's architechture is too distinctively American to be useful on my European Layout. 3. Cafe Corner. Lots of brown tiles, some tan and dark blue. Unfortunately uses panels instead of widows. I've always felt the ground floor and upper portions are mismatched, I like both individually but feel they don't go well together. 4. Green Grocer. My favorite standalone model but I find sand green less widely useful for mocs, so its the only modular I have only one of. Has many nice parts otherwise and lots of tiles. 5. Market Street. Interesting colours but like GG not widely useful for town/train buildings. Nice stair tecnique. Less unique elements due to being a factory set.

I hope you're haveing a lot of fun answering all the normal questions; How long did it take you, how many bricks, can I have a go .... :-) I always consider a train show a sucess if I didn't kill any kids.

I'd love a ZXR 600, but that paint job is way to loud for my taste. I'm not a fan of Kawasaki racing green. When I bought my Across, I wanted a red one, but mine had low km's and was in pretty good condition.

Sorry I wasn't careful when I posted this and mixed things up; the order is being made through Toyworld not TRU.

One of the MUGS (Melbourne LUG) is currently negotiating a bulk purchase through Toys R Us so they will be at TRU in Australia.

You can use the normal battery box, but it's larger and therefore will be visible in the tender. Others have solved this problem by building it into a baggage car. You can also do without the IR remote and receiver, but you lose the ability of remote control, and different speed settings.

The straight conductor rail works with no problem, the curved one doesn't clip down very well as the extra sleepers seem to be in the wrong position for the conductor rail.

I think they can be OK together, though if you want some european goods wagons in 7 wide you should take a look at Monteur's brickshelf folder. His MOCs are my favourites.

The engine has the colours of the railway company, the unpainted stainless steel cars were designed to have lower maintainence requirements, and a futuristic look.

Has anybody else noticed we all seem to have new motorbike tags :-) I'd like to say thanks for mine, it made me very happy when I noticed it. I know Big Cam has had one for a while but they seem to be a lot more common now.

This is one of the sets I remember from the catalogues of my childhood. I was intrigued by it but never really wanted it because the electronics brick detracted from the realism of the train. I still hope to one day own the 343 ferry from the same era.

Yeah, I think you've taken my 'expensive' too strongly, what I mean't by it was AU$159 would easily put it on par with the garage as far as size of set. As the garage was the bigest of that wave of sets, it's fair to call it a flagship set, so it's probably also fair to call the Public Transportation a flagship, if it's a similar size.

While I have no way of knowing first hand if my info is correct, it has been confirmed now by lightningtiger. On the other hand your reasoning for doubting it makes no sense to me. You believe if we get a Public Transport set it will be an elevated train, but by your own admission that's unlikely because we know other train sets will be released this year. To me that would suggest that the belief in the elevated train is mistaken. That would lead me to the conclusion that we'll get something like a bus terminus and taxi rank, maybe with a couple of vehicles. As far as the anger of AFOL's I don't believe reasonable AFOL's will be angry, I'll be happy if we get any new civilian set. Secondly, the poll was run by ToysRUs, arguably aimed at kids, so I dont think AFOL opinions will be very important in the choice anyway. The only way I can see the elevated train as being a reasonable option is if the set is purely the elevated station, with bus stop and taxi rank, but no train. Since it appears the US wont get the trains till after Europe, then if this is the case it makes sense that the fans choice set will be delayed till the new trains are released in the US. Since the US is a very price sensitive market, and trains are seen as expensive, the trains may be being delayed in the hope the economy picks up in the mean time. That would also explain why the toy fair announcement didn't happen. It would also tie in nicely with the relatively small station in the trains release. All speculation but at least it doesn't seem contradictory to what others are reporting. I don't think it's nice to blame TLG when in all probability it may be TRU has control over the announcement and not TLG. Also just because not knowing may not be nice, whether that's due to the actions of others or our own expectaions is a reasonable question.

I'm with batbrick on this, I mostly build train and town, so I purchase sets which I like in those themes, picking up the modulars if I can on sale, or importing them from the US to keep the price down. I also buy other sets that may be useful such as space truck getaway (awesome container, truck and greeble parts) some of the licenced lines like IJ. Since my budget is limited I will buy what I can on sale and miss out on other stuff, since I can get more that way. If I really need something for a Moc Bricklink is my freind.

It's not odd that Lego Australia won't talk about it. a) TLG policy is not to talk about unreleased sets b) since its a TRU exclusive they probably have a contract which says TRU get to announce the set. $159 is pretty expensive for an exclusive and for city, I'd call that a flagship set for the city range. I might go down to my TRU myself, I'd love to confirm what the set is for myself.

According to some guys on the Sydney Lego Train Club mailing list; "walk into a TRU ask the staff member about a TRU Lego exclusive set give the set number get them to look in the Lego city section on their system, when 8404 comes up ask them to click on it up comes Public Transportation at $159.95 AUD" I hope they're correct as I like this option better than the truck stop.

I'm pretty sure if you search for Bodville, and look around on his site you'll find a bumper car Moc, which had a technic chain with magnets on it under an upside down base plate.

They had a few in Barkley Square Brunswick this afternoon, though they only had one after I left

Yep, I'm pretty familiar with both the M>LTC layout and Phil's classic town layout, so anything like new Bodville's bridge and the Carillion stick out :-) It was pretty nice for a rushed job. I wish I could increase my building speed.

I agree with Cpt Zuloo about the refrigerated car perhaps you should build a parcel van instead if you intend to use the train doors. I can remember being very impressed that milk cartons in Canberra had a carillion design on them. Do they still have that? BTW I was born in Canberra, but left when I was three. I've only been back a couple of times since.