MOROP
Encyclopedia
MOROP is a Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an association that federates national associations of (real) railroad and model railroad enthusiasts. MOROP was founded in Genoa
Genoa
Genoa |Ligurian]] Zena ; Latin and, archaically, English Genua) is a city and an important seaport in northern Italy, the capital of the Province of Genoa and of the region of Liguria....
(Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
) in 1954 and now has its headquarters in Bern (Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
). In 2006, MOROP federated 22 national associations from 17 European countries, with a total of more than 30,000 members. The term "MOROP" is a portmanteau word derived from "MOdellbahn" (German for "model train") and EuROPe.
The most important activity of MOROP is to define and maintain the Normen Europäischer Modellbahnen (NEM) standards for model railroads. Since 1994, close ties have been established with the NMRA which defines model railroad standards for the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. For example, the NEM standards for Digital Command Control
Digital Command Control
Digital Command Control is a standard for a system to operate model railways digitally. When equipped with Digital Command Control, locomotives on the same electrical section of track can be independently controlled....
(DCC) have been defined by working with the NMRA.
The NEM standards and other official documents of MOROP are published in French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
and German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
. Some NEM standards have been translated into English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, but these translations are not currently normative. The MOROP web site is currently available in French, German and English.
MOROP holds annual public conventions usually held in September, in changing European locations.
See also
- NMRA - National Model Railroad Association
- Normen Europäischer Modellbahnen (NEM) - Standards for model railroads, defined by the MOROP
- Digital Command ControlDigital Command ControlDigital Command Control is a standard for a system to operate model railways digitally. When equipped with Digital Command Control, locomotives on the same electrical section of track can be independently controlled....
(DCC) - a standard for digital control of model railroads