Creating Magic Underground: A Luxurious Miniature Railway Experience at a 5-star Hotel
- Daniel Mason
- 13 hours ago
- 5 min read
This weekend (30th Nov 25) Miniature Railway Workshop were asked to meet an unusual and unique request; to build a miniature railway underground in the carpeted ball room of a 5-star hotel in central London.
Here at MRW we have been building miniature railway products for over 7 years and our MD Daniel Mason has been volunteering on miniature railways for 20 years. All that experience goes a long way when you get a unique request, especially when it comes at short notice.
A Tight Time Frame
On the 4th of November we received the first call to ask if we were able to supply a miniature railway for the 30th - "Sure no problem" was the immediate response, but further conversations entailed with a whopping 35 emails back and forth with multiple phone calls and discussions to confirm the logistics.
The Unique Request
The hotel wanted this railway for their staff “kids' party.” Yes that is right, this was just for the hotel's staff! After experiencing the hospitality and the service they provide you can see they really care for not only their visitors but also their workforce. They were willing to pull out all the stops for their Xmas party which included a custom miniature railway inside their underground ball room.
A track plan was drawn out in our SCARM software (widely available and free to download) that enabled us to quickly explore different track layouts with the client and also establish what was and wasn't possible in such a tight space. The total amount of room allowed was just 26.5 x 10 M leaving enough space for a dance floor, buffet, stage, nine dining tables, and multiple activities suitable for the kids.
It was a tall order for us to meet but SCARM showed that the (S) Radius track we manufacture would be suitable with its 4.5M [14.8ft] radius curve - this is the tightest curve we offer in the Jubilee range and is realistically the tightest curve you can use in 7 ¼ gauge and still take passengers.
In the end time was against us and we opted to use more K radius curves over the S rad for the loop meaning we would only need to get 20 S rad made in the tight 3 week lead time.
The K Rad is a generous 9.4M [30.9ft] radius curve and one we use widely across multiple events, especially those connected with our non-for-profit Portable Railway Club. With the track plan set and the track in production our mind turned to ensuring we had a loco available - one of our Titans was pressed into service complete with custom lettering on the side.
Transportation and Logistics
Normally for all of our portable events we just use a large Ifor-Williams Trailer which you will have seen out and about at events or on our social media but for this job the venue had a proper loading bay and we had to use it to unload….the only problem was that it is 3 feet in the air! So our low slung trailer was not going to fit the bill.
Building the Railway
Sunday the 30th of November loomed and at the ridiculous hour of 3am we left the house to collect the team and start our journey into central London. As the sun started to rise we crossed the M25 into London and by 7.30 am we were checked in and unloading track with the aid of a pallet truck into the commercial lift.
Our entire railway including 50 track panels, coach, two locos, driving trucks and everything else you can think of including Santa hats all fitted into the lift with space left to swing a track panel. The scale of the hotel was truly a shock after spending months working in an industrial unit in Kirkby-in-Ashfield.
To lay the track we had the aid of the track pan which showed the order of where to lay each panel but we needed to lay a ground protection layer first. Using a special self adhesive clear matting we were able to protect the cream carpet from our track panels and also any risk of dropping oil or grease from the loco.
After arriving at 7.30 am the entire railway was set up and running by 10.45am. With test train laps complete, the team retired to the internal staff canteen where the food and service was better than most restaurants! The railway ran for 3 hours from 12 - 3 and in that time the flow of passengers continued and the train only stopped to let people on and off. Each ride was nearly two complete loops of the track as the venue wanted to have a specific drop off and collection platform.
How did the railway perform?
As you would hope and expect from this kind of event, there wasn't a single operating incident and no derailments which is always what we all want when running miniature trains.
The loco performed flawlessly, with the only issue being the controller starting to get warm after 2.5 hours of continuous running. It should be noted that the 4QD controller benefits from additional cooling if high load scenarios are expected. The inbuilt temperature display and warning system did an excellent job of protecting the electronics and alerting the driver to the risk.
It should be noted that the track is only 4.5M [14.8ft] radius and the station was required to be in the middle of the curve. This meant that the load on the controller of the loco was extremely high and after an extended period of time this did rise. The solution on the day was simple - we just extended the station stops by 30-60 seconds and encouraged the passengers to take pictures once they sat on the train. This did the trick and just gave the controller that few extra moments to cool down. If we were expecting to do this kind of event again I would consider some additional cooling on the controller but for normal everyday use even under high load this should not be necessary.
We will however be taking this information on board for the development of future locomotives and ensuring controller cooling is possible on all new locos.
Would we do it again?
In summary, the event was amazing. A real show stopper which presented its own challenges but the rewards were 10 fold. One of our volunteers, Peter who helped for the event with his son Jacob said the following, “The perfect event. Perfectly executed, everything planned out and worked extremely well, the hotel and passengers were delighted. Thanks for allowing Jacob and me to be part of it.”
To get your own S radius loop of track and loco why not take a look at our starter set.
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