How many cranks are there out there?

[4SRKT]

I posted something on a different thread earlier that got me thinking about just how many of us there are. Back in the '80s there were spotters/bashers/gricers/cranks everywhere, but I reckon it's declined a bit since then. By 'cranks' I specifically mean diesel enthusiasts, but wouldn't limit this to followers of classic traction, so I'm not discriminating against fans of 67s or anything

In the company I work for there are about 1,000 employees. There are two known cranks. If this is extrapolated into wider society it means that society is comprised of 99.8% normals. This seems like a small number of cranks until you pro-rata it across the UK population and get 120,000 cranks, which seems a little high to me. Put another way, if 0.2% of the population are cranks, that would mean 900 cranks in Bradford Metropolitan District (where I live) alone, something I find extremely hard to believe.

It seems a little depressing to think that with two of us, our company of 1,000 people actually has a significant over-representation of cranks in its ranks.

What do the rest of you reckon?

 

[Metroland]

There's no reliable figures of enthusiast numbers, nor do all enthusiasts fit one bill. Some never go trainspotting, take pictures, play rail simulation games, do model railways, and it might just be limited to the odd visit of a museum.

If you look at typical magazine sales - and it seems to me magazine buying is done by a minority of enthusiasts, there are at least 20 titles. (not including journals of clubs, societies, preserved railways of which there are many hundreds). Sales of very often of upward of 30-40,000 per title. Most people only buy 1 or 2 of the titles at most.

A single typical model railway show can attract 20,000 people, museums can attract millions of people over the year.

But then not everyone who visits museums, or preserved railways is an enthusiast, typically only 20% of people. The other 80% are families looking for a day out or historical interest.

I have seen figures of 250,000 serious rail enthusiasts in the UK (derived from magazine sales) 2 million less serious ones (the sort of people that might turn up at a museum). But there is no break down what those individual interests are to my knowledge, so any figure put forward for the number of cranks is guesswork.