The IRFCA Community

IRFCA started as a mailing list but today, not only is it a lively and active electronic discussion forum, but the railfans associated with IRFCA form a vibrant community and do more than just exchange e-mail. Members of the IRFCA mailing list in a particular region may also meet in person to go railfanning at local train stations or on longer trips (by train, hiking, etc.), or sometimes just to chat about trains or watch videos, etc. Members also gather yearly for conventions! Some members are involved in restoration efforts and heritage preservation activities with Indian Railways.

Members' Pages

Many members of the community maintain their own websites. Typically these contain trip reports, photos, videos etc;

Here's a partial listing of such sites. Some of these are maintained on the IRFCA Server, while others are on third-party sites like Flickr, YouTube, Vimeo, FotoPic etc; Filter for the type of web pages you are interested in:

BlogSpot pages by IRFCA members

Abhishek Gopal

World from My Eyes - a blog

Annual Conventions

IRFCA members also meet once a year for the "IRFCA Convention". These conventions are a good way to meet new members, participate in discussions, give presentations and exchange notes about IR.

Eighth convention: Mughalsarai, at the Backley Institute (Suruchi Sansthan) (9-10 February 2013) Discussion on the forum
Seventh convention: Kolkata, at the Rotary Sadan auditorium (28-29 January 2012). Discussion on the forum
Sixth convention: Bhusaval, at the Zonal Railway Training Centre (5-6 February, 2011).
Fifth convention: New Delhi, at the National Railway Museum (6-7 February, 2010).
Fourth convention: Bangalore (24-25 January 2009).
Third convention: Kanpur (2008).
Second convention: Chennai (2007).
The first convention was held in Pune in February 2006.

Presentations from some of the IRFCA conventions are available here.

Mailing List Archive

E-mail messages posted to the IRFCA mailing list from the early years are available on this website at the mailing list archive. Later messages (from late 1999 to late 2010) can be found at Yahoo Groups. The most recent messages are on the IRFCA forum.