Section distribution.

[Keith Clements]

Some members have asked about the section boundaries and which section they should be in and whether we need more sections. One of the things I can do with a bit of programming is to show the geographical distribution of members. So here is a snippet of such a map. Not all members may be displayed and some may be displayed incorrectly due to inconsistences in the database, but at least it gives you an idea.

Due to a programming anomaly the larger orange markers sporadically appearing are those who joined in 2015! The orange ones in Europe are as you would expect.

[David Morris]

Hi Keith,

Well done! But what a mess! I suppose it stems from the freedom we allow to members to decide which section they would like to join? The heavy-handed way to sort this out might be for the executive to mandate which sections members should fall into by post code allocation. But Jowetteers are a prickly lot and would rebel against this! Why do we need to have boundaries? I guess it helps sections contact new and existing members and organise events that are local to them?
As for the suggestion that we need even more sections....please no! There are obviously quite enough already!

All the best,

David

[Chris Spencer]

David personally I disagree with you - I live between two sections - Southern & Midlands (although I am a Southern member) - the activities for both sections are well out of sensible travelling distance for me - most of the Southern events & meetings being South coast based along with the Midlands events & meetings being - well - Midlands based - I and quite a few others within the Thames valley and West London area are therefore in no mans land when it comes to sections unless we want to travel significant distances to events & meetings - probably ok if you are retired and have the time but for those members that reside within the Thames valley area that still have to earn an living - it is very difficult. Now I do not expect to have a section formed on my doorstep but early discovery / research has been on the back burner for several months in order to better serve the members of the said area - there is still work to do and it's not a matter that the Southern or Midlands sections are not serving their members - but geographically it would difficult for the two sections to serve the members of the Thames valley area. So going forward further research will continue along with discussions at committee level and with the two sections has how we has club can ensure that all of our members are supported regardless of geographical location.

[Keith Clements]

Another possibility which I could program is to show the current regular meeting centres with say a 40 mile radius around them and then identify those members not served by an accessible section meeting. Note that the North East section was the first new one to be formed, followed by the Severnside and then the North West , if memory serves me well. These sections were formed mainly because of the lack of meetings in those respective areas and a number of people in that unserved area willing to organise events.

Personally I do not think a section is necessary as it should be possible with email and telephone to organise an event centred anywhere. Indeed the Members Mapping system has that capability and can provide a list of emails and telephone numbers of members within a given radius. As you probably can see I am very much on the border of the Southern section with East Anglian and Midland section meeting centres about the same driving time away (all about 2 hrs) as my Southern Section meetings. So a four hour journey for an evening meeting is a challenge, but I do it sometimes.

The important thing is to encourage sections and individuals or groups of members to organise events. Well over half the members are on email ,so the Members Mapping system could be used to email likely attendees. The remainder could be contacted by phone.

There is a calendar of events which any organiser can add events into using a simple Google system. So those looking for something Jowett can look there and in the events section of JowettTalk.

There are other facilities which are used by the young ones to organise meetings that quickly allow a consensus to be formed on dates and other arrangements. They could be very effective if enough JCC members were able to use them.

Personally I think the Jowetteer has too much of a delay in it to organise all but the most stable of events. I almost made a long journey to a Midland section meeting a few months ago but luckily phoned up Richard Gane who told me it had been cancelled.

[Nick Webster]

That is a fine piece of work, but of course not all members are "active" within groups. It would be interesting to generate such a map showing vehicles known to be running. This might indicate a different type of distribution and be useful to those of us who are working on and aspire to have a vehicle that actually goes. I regret that in these Northern reaches of the E.A. Section, since the sad passing of Clive Warren, I have not seen another running Javelin within 40 miles.
(Don't feel pressured, Webmaster, it is just a theroretical contemplation).

Nick

[Keith Clements]

One possibility is to have a similar map for cars. Every year we should complete our renewal form. Years ago that form contained boxes for your cars and one of them recorded its condition. We could have that and add another box stating how many miles that car did last year (or its mileometer reading).
Yet another possibility is to have event organisers record members present at meetings and if they are in a Jowett.
Such information is useful in many other ways, giving JCS some idea of how much cars are used so they can make the correct decisions on spares purchases.
Since we are a club with an eclectic range of cars, the existing First Aid Scheme also directs us to those with similar vehicles and a nucleus of people wanting or willing to help get a Jowett on the road. To see this being displayed on a map, go to the 'Login to On-line Services' page that comes up when you login to Jowett.net (JT) and click on the First Aid button.

[Chris Spencer]

I don't think attempting to organise events on a telephone / email basis of members that are currently poorly served by club sections due to members geographical location - that is in no way any disrespect to the sections in question - we has a club have expanded it's membership over a number of years and where identified have formed sections within a region in order to cater for the membership - A section forms a nucleus for the members of the region and allows for gatherings attendance of events, section meetings and most importantly of all 'Ownership' - to ad hoc communicate with members via e mail / telephone to inform of events and encourage involvement will not give any form of ownership and may still leave members feeling somewhat isolated

[Keith Clements]

The JCC UK members map has been updated with all members known as of 1st September 2017.

It highlights new members for 2016 and 2017 so you can make an effort to contact them!

So when you login to Jowett.net click the 'UK First Aid' button half way down the page.
With some judicious adjustment of the + and - buttons in the bottom right you can zoom into the area you desire and with the use of browser window zoom you can get the desired size of pin on the map.

This is the updated section map, still with that programming anomaly!

[Keith Clements]

Map updated April 2018