Building a scene into a community

A Rough Start

Rockwall County Car Meet (RCCM) was started in July of 2016 in response to the inactive nature of its predecessor, Rockwall Modified Meet (RMM). It was originally created by Nathaniel Marsh, and quickly grew from the Rockwall Lowe’s parking lot. Around early November, he made the need for more admins known, and so I stepped up to do social media and digital work, along with general administration.

Moving Up

Around January 2017, we had a few instances that resulted in us having to find a new spot to meet. Since we didn’t have explicit permission to be anywhere, we decided to alternate between two places: the local CiCi’s Pizza and a large overflow parking lot for a retail/dining development called The Harbor Rockwall. This was done in an attempt to make our footprint smaller and hopefully not get asked to leave. Due to an overwhelming amount of support for the Harbor, as the large, empty parking lot proved favorable to many, we soon halted our alternating and began meeting at the Harbor every week. It was also around this time that I began taking my own photos at the meet for our social media.

Moving Up

As soon as we moved to the Harbor full-time, attendance began to pick up over the coming months. More and more people were coming out every week, often resulting in more issues with behavior, but overall a bigger and better meet. Also, I began to watermark my photos, starting in July, with my photography name: Awesome Texas Photography.

Stumbling

Alas, all good things must come to an end; Even as we worked with the local police department to handle people from out of town who couldn’t behave themselves, we were officially asked not to come back to the Harbor. This caused us to bounce around between a few spots, while losing about 80% of our regular attendees. It would be a few months before we got a new spot with permission.

Rebuilding

Despite all odds, we eventually got permission from a local businessman to use his restaurant’s — Samee’s Pizza Getti — parking lot. We still required permission from the city, but they luckily decided to give us a second chance, but with the requirement of reporting to them on a monthly basis on how things are going. Our numbers continued to be nowhere near what they used to be, but we were active and well.

Coming Full-Circle

In September of 2018, we politely asked the city if we could move back to the Harbor, and they surprisingly said yes! With our old, amazing spot back, things are beginning to pick up once more. It is also around this time that I decided to step down as a meet organizer for RCCM, as I had just enrolled at the University of Texas at Dallas, and thus wasn’t as available as before.