Car enthusiasts in Tantramar have a place to gather each week as the Tantramar Motor Society continues to grow its Saturday evening cruise-ins in Sackville.
The group meets in the Home Hardware parking lot, where rows of classic cars, modified imports, motorcycles and newer vehicles draw owners and visitors alike. Founder Tim Trenholm said the cruise-ins began midway through last season and have since attracted people from across southeastern New Brunswick, as well as visitors from elsewhere in the province and neighbouring provinces.
For Trenholm, the idea was simple: create something local.
“I found that a lot of, like, there’s Claudette’s two big shows a year, but there wasn’t anything really going on on the weekends or during the week,” he said. “I just wanted to see some more of that, like fill that gap. I wanted to see more car related stuff in the community, but also bringing families together and inspiring the kids to want to get involved as well.”
The Saturday gatherings are open to everyone, whether they arrive in a restored classic, a daily driver, a motorcycle or simply come to look around. Trenholm said the goal has always been to make the club welcoming.
“It’s a multi-generational car club of all makes, models, shapes, sizes, colors, styles,” he said. “It’s just about passing it on to the next generation, the next generation better than the last.”
His own interest in cars started early.
“My next-door neighbor Jason Rose, he was into this stuff when I was very young, and then it just went from there,” Trenholm said. “Watching him build stuff, it gave me a drive to wanna do it, and here I am 34 years old and doing it every weekend, every week, every possibility I can get.”
That passion is reflected in his green 2012 Mazda 3 GX, a car he originally bought as a daily driver before gradually customizing it. Today, he said, it represents much more than a “project car.”
“My grandmother started calling it that after we painted it green last spring, and she passed away in February,” he said. “So this is now sentimental to me. This will never leave. I will never get rid of it.”
Longtime organizer Claudette Long said she remembers Trenholm coming to her with questions before launching the club. She said she encouraged him to take the first step and offered to help where she could.
“He started coming around with us, then all of a sudden he just asked question. We told him, ‘Go for it. We’ll help him out,'” Long said. “He asked a lot of questions, and how does he start? I said, ‘Well, how do you start? You start by saying, “Let’s go for it.”‘
For Trenholm, the weekly cruise-ins have become about more than showing off vehicles.
“Just basically a space that everybody can get together and get along and have a good time and, you know, hear some stories from times before we were ever born,” he said. “Sometimes it’s not even about the cars, it’s about bringing people together.”
More information about the Tantramar Motor Society, including upcoming cruise-ins and events, is available on the group’s Facebook page.
