Hear brass locomotives running on real steel rail across 310 m² of indoor city
Real rails, real sparks
The collection of Nobutaro Hara: around 6,000 vehicles with about 1,000 on display, 100,000 photographs and 440 hours of film. The centrepiece is Ichiban Tetsumo Park, a gauge-1 layout of roughly 310 m² with a 70 m circuit and about 450 m of track.
Why it's unique
This is one man's collection, built over a lifetime, and it exists nowhere else. Hara built and gathered thousands of models, and the museum shows them alongside his photographs and film.
The layout is the reason to go in person. It runs on genuine metal rail rather than the usual plastic, and the models are heavy brass drawing current from overhead wire, so you hear wheel on rail and see real sparks from the collectors. That is the whole point, and it does not come across in a photograph. The museum's own wording is that it is one of the world's largest indoor dioramas; we make no larger claim than that.
Before you go
Tickets are for a set date and time and must be bought in advance, through e-plus or a FamilyMart machine. There is no reliable walk-up.
It is closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays as well as during maintenance periods, so check before you plan around it. The museum and the city tourism site publish different prices; go by what you see at booking. The main station on the layout is modelled on Lyon. Despite a common assumption, it is open.