BIG NEWS! New Rc Flying Field!
Rend Lake RC Club is happy to announce that a new flying field is now under construction! It's been a secret so hard to keep and wouldn't even had been possible without Rend Lake College and it's President Terry Wilkerson!
They are a progressive college in the RC side if things offering FAA Part 107 cert, Ag aerial survey, and more classes coming. We can't thank them enough for this great opportunity!
Many clubs these days are finding themselves loosing their fields, so I hope this will help provoke some thoughts and ideas to those with colleges near them. This will just be an overview of what's taking place right now, as there is plans for a full article with AMA on how this all came about.
This whole process started about two years ago. We had approached the college president about the possibility of moving the current field located on the north side of the college to a different location. The reasons for this was on our predominate wind (south) days we would always be taking off towards the campus. Which for many years was no issue as planes were smaller and there was little to no turbines in use. Well, as we all know times change and planes get bigger and we now have quiet a few interested and flying turbine aircraft. We had looked at a couple locations off and on, but issues had always come up, power lines, tree lines and such. Then this past October we met again and a perfect location had become available and all agreed it would work.
As for the field layout, it was pretty much modeled after Eli Field in Monticello, Illinois.
Something that has come from the new field construction that we are super happy about is a new working relationship with the college. The college holds summer camps for kids every year, this year we are doing a first "Glider and RC Flight" camp.
Our September "Warbirds Over Rend Lake" proceeds will be going to the Rend Lake College Foundation which gives grants to students.
They also have a culinary department who we are in discussions with about cooking for our events and they get the sales for their program. And much much more in the works!
Here are some shots from the last couple weeks showing progress on the new field. Be sure to follow us on Facebook for many more updates and plans for the new field.
