A Return to Wunderland

Rio de Janeiro, new to Miniatur-Wunderland

Four years after spending most of a day in the world’s largest miniature railroad (and airport) layout, Hamburg’s Miniatur-Wunderland and writing about it on TravelGumbo, I paid another pilgrimage to the small world and its expanded premises.

Hamburg’s warehouse district, and an animated building fire

Expanded not only in terms of what parts of the world are modeled, but in overall space: it has reached out across a Hamburg canal with a glass bridge that connects its new exhibits in the next building.

Trains cross to the new building in a tunnel in the floor with viewing glass

Under construction across the bridge: South America, Provence and Monaco,  and eventually the Antarctic

Viewing some of the old favorites gave me an opportunity to compare them with the newer construction, and I have to say it’s a mixed bag. Some of the newer ‘lands’ are built with the same meticulous sense of scale and place mixed with humor as the originals; others seem to have lost perspective, scale or detail.

This one is slightly less puzzling  when you find the tiny cable car in mid-air

None of that seemed to interfere, however, with the troops of kids and parents making their way through the vast exhibits; the operators have wisely preserved the experience by limiting tickets. Reservations recommended, but it’s also possible to walk in, sign up and wait in the cafe for an opening.

Let’s take a moment for Wunderland’s proud statistics: nearly half an acre of floor space, 260,000 figures, 9,250 cars, 1,040 trains, 42 planes, 130,000 trees, 15.4 kilometres of track, 4,110 buildings, 1,380 signals, 385,000 LEDs. Putting that all together, so far, has taken 760,000 hours of construction work and €37 million. And more is planned, with new work stretching out to 2027.

Many of the 260,000 figures are attending large-scale events…

Every day’s 24 hours are compressed into a 15-minute cycle of day and night

In real world size, that 15.4km would be nearly 1400 kilometres of railroad! Clearly, a real-word size control center is needed for that, and it is now visible to visitors. There are also occasional glimpses of switches and other ‘behind-the-scenes’ devices.

In the four years since my last visit, a new section of Central Germany has been added, along with Monaco and Provence and parts of South America, along with an exhibit that’s meant to show ‘the world from above.’

Rio, at top, and above with its beautifully-detailed Municipal Theatre, is a new departure for Miniatur-Wunderland; it was built by Argentinian craftspeople, the first scene not built in-house. ‘Regenwald,’ or Rain Forest will be a future part of Wunderland’s Brazil.

Construction at Wunderland takes place out in the open; if you happen to be there during working hours for the crew, you can watch, and even when they are not working, the evidence of things to come is easy to spot. And,  just to keep the theme going, here’s a display that includes demolition of an older building and new construction behind it!

Next up is the completion of South America including a rainforest area, and then a Formula One race layout. Next year, Central America and the Caribbean, and then Asia. No small ambitions here!

The airport always draws a crowd with model aircraft of many different models, including a Concorde and a flying pickle move across the field and ‘take off’ with the aid of invisible wires. There’s a crowd outside the airport, too, with a traffic jam’s worth of cabs waiting for passengers.

Some mountain scenery is unconvincingly exaggerated, but you just have to believe that bat flying over a deep canyon. It’s a bird… it’s a plane… it’s Miniatur-Wunderland!