RV Park thoughts, suggestions & ideas.

[rox]

Eddie,

It is very enjoyable to read all abut your plans and ideas.
About the picnic tables i would guess that most people would put them in a screen house or else under their awning. We all need shade protection for meal time. I was thinking the ideal picnic table would be narrow. When we had our camper we had an attached screen house, that attached to the awning and then also directly to the camper. One thing I didn't like is that the picnic table at our permenent campsite was too wide. We had it placed in the screen house attached to the camper and it was so wide I could not get around it. Therefore I had to have it way at the end of the screen house. If I wanted to get tot he other end without sitting on the bench and sliding down, I ahd to go outside and enter at the end corner. This is how I come up with my suggestion of making them narrow enough to fut under the awning of the campers. if they are to wide, people are sitting in the sun.

Although your idea of putting them in cement sounds like a good idea for maintenance, I know that that would have been a disapointment to me, i would always prefer a mobile picnic table, so that i could put it exactly where I want it under my awning or independent and seperate screen house.

With the screen houses you can hang a light from the frame and play a game or cards on the picnic table at night.

 

[AlanB]

I would not permanently mount my picnic tables.

When we mowed a campground, the picnic tables were the least of the problems.

You may be suprised what Vo-techs and Schools are willing and eager to do. I know a buddy of mine that had 100 or so tire bead breakers made, and they are far more complicated then what you have in mind (albeit smaller) I would think in Texas with the oil work etc. that goes on out there that the Vo-tech's would welcome a useful pipe working project that someone else paid the materials tab on.

 

[ronjhall]

In our limited time with a Motorhome. It amazes me what campgrounds call a level site. The hydraulic jacks on our motorhome can lift both axles about 6" off the ground. Yet many of the parks we have stayed at, our motorhome cannot be leveled with the jacks. If you are renting a 65' site. I would expect that length of level. Not just the 20' in center of the site.
One other item would be with the secure RV storage. Include some undercover storage. I am sure your dad would like to be storing his motorhome under a roof instead of out in the open.

 

[ronjhall]

Rox,

It's just a word, but to me "Resort" is used for the places that don't want kids, don't let in older RV's and only let one pet in that's under 40 pounds. In other words, they are very uppity.

The park we stayed at when visiting you, calls their place a RESORT. I did not get the idea they were uppity or didn't want kids. I do like the Destination description though.
Having a limit on size and number of pets IMHO is a great way to control this common problem in many campgrounds. It can very easily get out of hand when campers do not control their pets.

 

[Bird]

Having a limit on size and number of pets IMHO is a great way to control this common problem in many campgrounds. It can very easily get out of hand when campers do not control their pets.

Amen!!!! You know, we found RVers to be some of the nicest people in the world, but we've seen enough of the ones who travel with pets (dogs, in nearly all cases) that I've said if I owned an RV park, I think I'd strictly forbid dogs (or any other animal that ever went outside the owner's RV). It does seem that RVers are usually the worst dog owners in the world. And yes, there was a time long ago when we traveled with a German Shepard in our motorhome.

Of course, all the suggestions in this thread are related to "destination" parks, and from Eddie's own description, that's what he's going to build. A whole different set of rules may apply to "transit" parks, which I think might be much more profitable and less work if they are in the right location.

Example: We spent 5 days once in Van Horn, TX. We arrived about 3 p.m., the RV park was very small, absolutely no facilities or recreation except water, electric, sewer, and cable TV hookups, restrooms and showers, coin operated washer & dryer, and a very tiny swimming pool. The entire park was flat and level and graveled. There was no one in the little locked office, but a sign on the door to go to the service station on the other side of the car wash next door to register. If I remember right, there were 75 RV sites; 3 occupied. Then about 4:30 p.m., the office opened, RVs started coming in off I-10 and by dark, the park was completely full. By 9 a.m. the next morning, only the 3 who had been there before, and us, were left. And that same thing happened every day that we were there. That must have been the lowest maintenance, highest profit RV park I've ever seen.

 

[bmac]

The hogs are a concern, as are the other wild animals. Usually hogs will avoid areas with lots of people, but there is not getting rid of them. I imagine I'll have spottings of them from guests on a regular basis, but hopefully it's a rare event. Trapping will help some before I open, but when I'm open, I think it will just create more problems than solve.

Snakes are a bigger concern. Not to mention fire ants, ticks, wasps and bees. All will cause problems and there's no getting rid of any of them.

Thanks,
Eddie

How about Saturday Hog Shoots? Betcha no other RV park has that as an activity.

 

[gemini5362]

Eddie,

You absolutely do not want to run coax. More expensive harder to work with etc etc. Run cat 5. Internet stuff is kind of weird, sometimes the newer is cheaper. If someone has a bunch of cat 5 to get rid of and it goes cheap then buy it but if someone needs it for something special (I am not sure what that would be) you might have to pay a premium for it. The current stuff made and sold is cat 6 before that and still very much used is cat 5e all those wires look the same. The only difference is in the amount of data it will handle. Cat 5 cable will handle 1,000,000 bits of data a second cat 5e and cat 6 will handle 1,000,000,000 bites a second obviously you dont need cat 5e and cat 6 but that might be all that is available. Your problems will be distance ones cat5/6 is only good for 300 feet. Some planning will take care of that problem though. For instance when you have a line of pads when you get to three hundred feet Add a small box in addition to the AC power and put in a Ethernet switch. On the internet you should be able to get one that handles 4 lines out for under 20.00 if you plan it right you can run 300 feet to that switch then come out from it 4 directions. Make sure you get switches and not hubs. Very minute price differences now but a world of performance difference. The connectors for cat 5 cable take a tool that is about 40.00 to buy and never wears out. They are a bit hard to make until you get a handle on them. but not a real hard thing to do.

What you are talking about is not a sub T1 the technical term for that is Fractional T1 not trying to be a snoot but is always better to know the correct term when you are talking to the installation people. I personally am not a big fan of fractional T1 lines. They have to run all the same stuff to do a fractional line as a regular T1 and they could charge you the same price as a fractional in my opinion. As I suggested before you really need to try to stay away from sattelite dish networks. The problem with them is the sattelite is way out in space and when you send a signal to it and it sends it back to its server on the earth it takes time to make the trip. My experience with home sattelite dish networks. ( basically DirectTV network) is that from the time I hit the key to do something there was a 1/2 second latency delay before stuff started coming back from a web site for instance. Now when that started coming back then it was fast but every time i hit a key was 1/2 half second before something happened. This is still a lot faster than dial up modems but it is noticeable. You might look into microwave internet, texas might be perfect for that. I know there was a place here that had it set up for a while. basically they put a microwave antenna on your property (like on top of a building) and align that with their microwave tower. no latency times like a sattelite dish and you can get high speed internet. I know someone that did not have access to dsl but their family across the creek did. My friends payed for the dsl line to the family then set up a microwave tower to their house and are running a web provider service off of that. You might also talk to your phone company about paying for the cost of a fiber optic line. I am sure that is very expensive but it might be cheaper in the long run than the price of a fractional t1. When they were talking about the fractional T1 where did they say the nearest POP is ( Point of Presence) usually T1 lines are based on the distance from the nearest POP.
Also with a T1 or a fractional you have to have a router. I am not sure if the ones you get for home would handle that. If you want to you can instant message me and I will give you my phone number I will be glad to answer any questions in this area I can.

 

[Jarrett]

...Something very western with tall poles on either side and a sign over the top with my logo and somehting that says "stable" or "horse hotel" or maybe something else...
Thanks,
Eddie

Since the name of the park will be "Wild Kingdom RV Park", name the horse area the "W. K. Corral"

 

[EddieWalker]

Eddie,

It is very enjoyable to read all abut your plans and ideas.
About the picnic tables i would guess that most people would put them in a screen house or else under their awning. We all need shade protection for meal time. I was thinking the ideal picnic table would be narrow. When we had our camper we had an attached screen house, that attached to the awning and then also directly to the camper. One thing I didn't like is that the picnic table at our permenent campsite was too wide. We had it placed in the screen house attached to the camper and it was so wide I could not get around it. Therefore I had to have it way at the end of the screen house. If I wanted to get tot he other end without sitting on the bench and sliding down, I ahd to go outside and enter at the end corner. This is how I come up with my suggestion of making them narrow enough to fut under the awning of the campers. if they are to wide, people are sitting in the sun.

Although your idea of putting them in cement sounds like a good idea for maintenance, I know that that would have been a disapointment to me, i would always prefer a mobile picnic table, so that i could put it exactly where I want it under my awning or independent and seperate screen house.

With the screen houses you can hang a light from the frame and play a game or cards on the picnic table at night.

Rox,

You guys are really giving me some second thoughts on my picnic tables. hahahaha

My plan was to use three PT 2x10's 12 feet long and cut them in half to 6 feet. Use one for the bench seat and the other two for the table. They are 9 inches wide and four of them will give me a table top 36 inches wide.

One of the problems with tables that can slide around is they can also be carried off. I'm trying to avoid the game of musical picnic tables and trying to keep them at there sites.

Grass is my favorite ground cover, but here in East Texas, fire ants are the number one enemy. We have lots of other biting bugs, but fire ants are the meanest and most agressive thing we have. If I can put the table on a concrete pad, then I can just about gurantee that you wont be bit or attacked by them. On the grass, it's not only possible, it's very likely that I'll have people attacked every weekend. I do plan to poison them on a regular basis, but there really is nothing that is very effective. Even when it does work, another colony will show up and start the whole process over again. Not to mention it's expensive and probably bad and not very environmentally firendly.

I've seen allot of those portable screened tents that people set up. I would imagine that if somebody wanted to, they could easily put one up around a picnic table on concrete as anywhere else. The table will be within a reasonable distance of the RV.

This brings up a question. How far would be the ideal distance for a picnic table from the RV? Pad is 12 feet wide. RV is 10 feet wide, but the slideouts will add another 3 feet, or two feet over the pad.

Should the table be parralle to the RV or perpendicular?

The additon of a light pole is something I've just recently started to consider. I don't want anything else into the concrete, so I'm thinking about welding a length of pipe onto the top of my frame and drilling a hole through the wood table top. Then being able to slide a metal light stand into the hole. Maybe a tall T shaped thing? One side for a hanging light, the other for something anything else?

Thanks,
Eddie

 

[EddieWalker]

I would not permanently mount my picnic tables.

When we mowed a campground, the picnic tables were the least of the problems.

You may be suprised what Vo-techs and Schools are willing and eager to do. I know a buddy of mine that had 100 or so tire bead breakers made, and they are far more complicated then what you have in mind (albeit smaller) I would think in Texas with the oil work etc. that goes on out there that the Vo-tech's would welcome a useful pipe working project that someone else paid the materials tab on.

Alan,

I agree that asking a teacher if there class would make the tables for the cost of materials is a good idea. It wont cost me anything to ask, that's for sure!!!

Can you explain why you wouldn't mount the tables permanently? I see it in public parks all the time and thought it was a smart thing.

Thanks,
Eddie