The trains are awesome but it’s the infrastructure (buildings, bridges, rails) that make the show for me.
Are the dimensions 124ft long x 23ft wide really that spectacular?
Me too. Was once an HO gage fanatic, when my son was small.
The surrounding cityscape is awesome!
I love trains. I really, really love trains. Real trains and model trains. I once accidently found a YouTube video of real trains and spent the next several hours one afternoon watching nothing but videos of trains. I’m the type of gal who will sometimes pull off the side of the road near a railroad crossing just to watch a train pass by.
My dad would put up a train display at Christmas and my older brother had a Lionel set from back in the 50’s. But never anything like this. A simple oval or two under the tree, some plastic houses glued together from a Plastic Town kit, fake trees and fake blanket of snow, lots of fun but not much on realism.
Many years ago, when I was still married, my husband and I went to a model train show and thought we (me actually more so than him) might get into the hobby. We went to several other shows and bought model railroading magazines, went to some hobby stores. But ultimately to do it “right” was beyond our means financially and timewise at the time, but I admire those who can and do.
After my divorce I did buy an HO starter set for myself for Christmas and built a simple plywood display table and had fun with it by adding a Rudolf The Red Nosed Rein Deer character set and a Simpsons set complete with a Quickie Mart and the Abdominal Snow Monster to the display. My many little nieces and nephews loved it when they came to my house and I loved watching them play with it, just like I did when I was a kid with my older brother’s trains.
“Sir Rod told Railway Modeller magazine that scenery and structure modelling, rather than locomotives, trackwork or electrics, are his forte.”
And that is what I found the most interesting part of the hobby among the serious hobbyists. The attention to the most minute detail and the artistry. Those buildings, that scenery, those aren’t from store bought kits and simply glued together in an afternoon.
I recall one of the model railroading magazines showing how to build rail stock from kits but then how to replace and upgrade the wheels and the couplers and how to add details like adding rust to the wheels and weathering the cars to make them look real, adding rust to the rails, how to make everything from the smallest bits of gravel and rocks and rail ties look absolutely realistic. It takes some serious devotion and a lot of time to build a display like Sir Rod’s. Good for him and I’m glad he shared it with us.