Hall of Science Amateur Radio Club likely to be evicted

New York City's historic Hall of Science Amateur Radio Club appears to have lost its fight to retain a station at its namesake home of 35 years.

Amateur Radio Newsline's Mark Abramowicz, NT3V, has the latest on the club's hunt for a new home:

Despite a cordial meeting and demonstration of amateur radio with the museum's boss, Thomas Tumino, N2YTF, says it appears very unlikely WB2JSM will ever be activated again from the Hall of Science.

"I would say that there is a 90 percent chance that it is all over at the Hall of Science," Tumino says.

You might recall a few months ago, we told you how the museum, located in Flushing Meadows on the site where the World's Fair was held in the mid-1960s, had asked the club to take down its antennas during a renovation project.

It then banned them from putting them back up and began talking about ousting the organization.

That sparked an on-line petition drive which netted some 13-hundred signatures.

But Tumino, president of the Hall of Science Amateur Radio Club, concedes that hasn't changed the museum's mind.

An item in the New York Daily News recently quoted a museum official as saying there isn't room for the amateur radio station.

Tumino says there were discussions with the museum about putting the ham radio exhibit on a cart on wheels with remote control of the radios. That's the 10 percent chance of return Tumino is talking about.

But, he concedes that's slim, and the Hall of Science Amateur Radio Club in New York, is now looking elsewhere for a home.

"A well-known New York City area ham, has kind of taken up our cause to some extent and is helping us with that," Tumino says. "So, we don't know yet whether that's a set solution, moving to another museum within the New
York City limits.

"But that also looks very promising and we've already had one meeting with that institution and hope to schedule a second."

While Tumino declined to identify that museum for fear of jeopardizing negotiations, he did say it may be in one of New York's boroughs - but not in Queens.

He did say it's an ideal operating location for amateur radio, especially emergency communications.

For the Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm , , in Philadelphia.

Mark Abramowicz, NT3V
Amateur Radio Newsline

If you would like to sign the petition to help keep the Hall of Science Amateur Radio Club at New York City's Hall of Science, please take your web browser to http://tinyurl.com/6ljost

Source: ARNewsline™