Chicago’s mighty new mini train

What has 34 model trains, more than 1,000 miniature automobiles and 1,485 mini-people going about their daily business?

It’s “The Great Train Story,” a $3-million model railroad display at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry. Opened this weekend, in time for the holidays, it replaces a more modest exhibit that choo-chooed through six decades.

The new display sprawls over 3,500 square feet of meticulously re-created American scenery from Seattle to Chicago. In the Emerald City, with its grassy parks, vintage Space Needle and new Experience Music Project, a ship loads containers onto the train for its journey east, past the Cascades, Rocky Mountains and Northern Plains farmlands and into Chicago. There are hundreds of custom-made structures, including 192 buildings, along 1,400 feet of track.

Visitors walk around and through the snake-shaped terrain, stopping at several interactive stations where they can raise drawbridges, blast tunnels, blow the horn of a container ship and more.

The trains are on a 1:87 scale; the scale of the scenery varies. Chicago’s Sears Tower tops out at nearly 14 feet, the Rockies at only 11 feet. The Windy City tooting its own whistle, perhaps?

The exhibit is included in museum admission, which is $9 for ages 12 and older and $5 for ages 3 to 11. Open daily except Dec. 25. Hours are 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday to Saturday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday. (800) 468-6674, www.msichicago.org.