As unpopular of an opinion as it may be, I feel R2R and that other site, are very much indirectly responsible for the downfall of local reef clubs. Not that it is a bad thing, to be honest. 10 years ago, there was very little reef information on the internet, you had one major site, but if you wanted information or to learn, most people were willing to drive that 30-45-1hr to go to meetings. Now honestly, what is the point?
Unless you live in a dense metro area with a bunch of reefers all withing 30 minutes of each other (So Cal guys come to mind), it is WAY easier and more convenient to do all of your business on R2R and places like it. Yes I understand there are benefits to face to face interactions that you will never get from an internet site, but as you just stroll through this thread and see all of the reasons people don't get involved in their "local" clubs, it's very telling and honestly hard to blame folks. My "local" clubs is 45 mins away for the closest meeting and 2 hours for the furthest. If I lived in ATL, Tally, Jax...etc I'm sure it would be different, but I don't, so for me it's honestly not worth the time/effort/expense...etc.
I have mentioned this before, but it's worth bringing up in this thread. The internet today is not like the internet of 5 or 10 years ago. I've been playing WoW since Vanilla (14? years now). I literally have friends from Texas who we went to Disney with last year, whom I had never met before, but had known for YEARS longer than many of my local friends. It's just a different time and unless you're in a major area AND have good people in your club, I don't see how local clubs can survive.
Don't underestimate Atlanta traffic lol! My travel time was generally at least an hour.