Modern Transportation Museum @ Bentencho Station

[bill937ca]

G scale trains on 45mm track you can drive with full size train master controller and brakes and watch on a big screen monitor.  This view looks very impressive with HSR trains, large buildings and those controls.  Drool, drool...

 

http://odamaki1031.cocolog-nifty.com/photos/uncategorized/2011/03/27/011.jpg

 

But as the focus of this layout is on train safety, signals appear on the screen as you are running the train. Ever notice how much focus the Japanese put on duplicating the drivers view from the cab rather than just weathering their trains? Its just not just museums that do that but train shows too that do this.

 

 

What I find interesting is that the rail joints are bonded (that's those little wires you see). This would suggest that the overhead is live and that the "feeders" from the rails are actually negative returns.  This is exactly how the prototype works in the real world instead of the model train world. 

 

Too bad the Series 321 EMUs have no under body details.

 

Official web page with details in Japanese:  http://www.mtm.or.jp/pavilion/safe/   

 

English language Museum page:  http://www.mtm.or.jp/eng/index.html

 

And a video that provides a good tour of the rest of the exhibits.

 

 

Another video of the museum. G scale layout appears at 1:35.

 

 

 

Edited June 3, 2013 by bill937ca

[miyakoji]

Nice videos. The Japanese wikipedia page says that in December, when JR West announced the new museum that will open next to Umekoji, they said that this one's future was under consideration. I wonder how it will turn out.

[cteno4]

Nice,

 

Very interesting that they focused so well on overall operations and safety. The schematical design of the layout and the stylized scenery and details focuses the visitors on this and not on the concepts and not on the scenery and rr details. Good exhibit design! Diorama quality scenery or worrying about perfect scale trains would have ruined this.

 

Jeff

Edited June 4, 2013 by cteno4

[Guest ___]

The current MTM is a very nice but it is terribly small. I was there in 10, by accicdent. The line for the train sim was rediculously long which was sad because it looked pretty fun

[westfalen]

I spent a morning there in 2011. It's not the biggest museum but they have a good representation of transport rather than just trains although that is what they concentrate on. There were a couple of school field trips visiting when I was there so I missed out on the simulator too.