See the world in various sizes of miniature.
The Baltimore area is surrounded by trains and subways and the Light Rail to ride to your heart’s content. We have plenty of train and streetcar museums to see transportation from bygone years. Then, come November and December, train gardens spring up like flowers after a cold winter.
You’ll see big and small exhibits, some with free entry or for a small donation. But no matter your choice, these displays are sure to add to your holiday spirit! Bring the kids or set up your babysitter or nanny with a great day out to visit any of these festive train gardens around our city.
Roads and Rails Museum
Address: 200 N. East St., Frederick, MD 21701
Hours: Monday, Friday, & Saturday, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. | Sunday, noon – 5 p.m.
Phone: 301-624-5524
Fees: Adults, $10 | Kids 3+, $5 (ages 2 & under, free)
You may want to start your train garden exploration here — one of the largest displays in the country. It’s sure to satisfy your need to see moving things in miniature, or you may want to save the biggest and best for last! The O scale layout has a zoo, Graceland, Hogwarts school, a circus, working volcano, subway, coal mine, an amusement park, a western town with cowboys and Native Americans, a castle, walk-through mountains, towns, and trains, trolleys, cars, and trucks. There’s also a Lego room with buttons to push, things to find, and stools so little ones can get a better view. Founded by David Burroughs, this display took more than three years to assemble.
Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department
Address: 5200 Southwestern Blvd., Baltimore, MD 21227
Hours: Open through Jan. 2, Monday – Friday, 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m. | Saturday & Sunday, 11 a.m. – 8:30 p.m. | Christmas Eve, New Year’s Eve, & New Year’s Day, 11 a.m. – 4 p.m. | Closed Christmas Day.
Phone: 410-242-6601
Fees: Free (donations accepted)
After years of separate displays at the Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department and Charles Richter’s Christmas Garden display at the Arbutus Auto Painting and Body Works, the displays are now merged. Connie and Chuck Adkins and their elves have coordinated this year’s glorious display. Considered the 24th annual exhibit, it has a number of children’s books as a theme. Dinosaurs are also featured, because everyone knows that trains and dinosaurs go together! Train sets will be raffled, so you can start your own obsession… um, collection.
Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Museum
Address: 901 W. Pratt St. Baltimore, MD 21223
Hours: Open through Dec. 31, Monday – Saturday, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. | Sunday, 11 a.m. – 4 p.m. | Closed on Christmas Eve & Christmas Day.
Phone: 410 -752-2490
Fees: Adults, $20 | Seniors (60+), $17 | Kids ages 2-12, $12 | Coach train rides, $3 ($2 with paid admission or free for B&O members) | First class train rides, $10 for adults & $6 for children ($4 for B&O members)
This is the place for big trains and little trains, alike, just in case you can’t decide which you want! The B&O Magical Holiday Express is devoted to trains of all sizes and shapes. Besides the old trains, the museum this year has a 30-foot Christmas tree in the center of the roundhouse — and you can walk through it! After you’ve looked at the trains, you can take a ride on one. Special weekend events during December include North Pole Adventures, Winter Royal Adventures, Frosty Fest with Frosty the Snowman, and Winterfest Wonderful. Beyond that are super events, including breakfast and train rides with Santa, breakfast with Elsa and friends, and storytime with Mrs. Claus.
Dundalk Patapsco Neck Historical Society
Address: 4 Center Place, Dundalk, MD 21222
Hours: Open through Jan. 7, Monday – Friday, 1 p.m. – 7 p.m. | Saturday & Sunday, noon – 8 p.m. | Closing at 5 p.m. on Christmas Eve, & closed on Christmas Day.
Phone: 410-284-2331
Fees: Free entry, but items sold in gift shop.
Stop by Dundalk when you want to see where your imagination can take you. This model goes between Ocean City and Dundalk with six trains and more than 150 action scenes. The circus has come to town and the zoo is there! This is the 17th annual garden, and trains run on four different levels, with the lowest level where the little ones can see the trains. By the way, this is not the Wise Avenue Volunteer Fire Company train garden, which is about 2 miles away. This is slightly smaller and attended by fewer people, which means you can see more and not feel rushed.
Ellicott City Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Station Museum
Address: 3711 Maryland Ave., Ellicott City, MD 21043
Hours: Open through Jan.28, Wednesday & Thursday, 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. | Friday & Saturday, 10 a.m. – 7 p.m. | Sunday, noon – 5 p.m. (Regular miniature train display available all year.)
Phone: 410-313-1945
Fees: Free
This Holiday Model Train Garden features a huge Lego Train display by the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Area LEGO Train Club, with buttons the youngsters can push to make things happen. It takes up a large portion of the lower level of the museum. The permanent display portrays the route between Baltimore and Ellicott Mills with a narrated film explaining the layout. There are three other smaller holiday-themed displays upstairs (handicapped accessible) that are about 3 feet-by-5 feet in size. Two of them are O gauge, and one is N gauge.
Fire Museum of Maryland
Address: 1301 York Road, Lutherville, MD 21093
Hours: Dec. 2, 9, 16, 27-30, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Phone: 410-321-7500
Fees: Adults, $14 | Seniors & firefighters, $12 | Kids ages 2-18, $6
Mix old fire engines and scenes from today and our past… and voilà! The setup here includes the Bromo Seltzer Tower (including the blue Bromo bottle), Gwynn Oaks Amusement Park, Baltimore Zoo, an old car dealership, the Viaduct, Baltimore neighborhoods, the subway, the Light Rail, and even a “working” fire. There are also photos of old Baltimore train gardens, and displays of miniature fire engines and firefighting equipment. They even have the history of train gardens that apparently dates from German immigrants, as early as the first part of the 19th century.
Marley Station Mall
Address: 2900 Governor Ritchie Highway, Glen Burnie, MD 21060
Hours: Open through Dec. 31, Monday – Saturday, 10 a.m. – 9 p.m. | Sunday, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m. | Closing at 6 p.m. on Christmas Eve & closed Christmas Day.
Phone: 410-766-7033
Fees: Bring donations of cash or canned goods, with proceeds going to the North County Emergency Outreach Network
Members of the Emmanuel Lutheran Church of Pasadena, Maryland, have been creating this train garden for two-dozen years, set up near the entrance to Macy’s on the second floor of the mall. The layout includes a Lego garden, a NASCAR track (complete with racing cars), and more than a dozen trains choo-chooing here and there on multiple levels. Raffle tickets are sold with model train sets and cash as prizes. In case you have an old train set (in any condition) that you don’t use any more, donate it or them to the Church to be included in future layouts. And if you can’t get enough of these trains, they’re always looking for volunteers!
The Shops at Kenilworth
Address: 800 Kenilworth Drive, Towson, MD 21204
Hours: Open through Jan. 5, Monday – Saturday, 10 a.m. – 9 p.m. | Sunday, 11 a.m. – 7 p.m.
Phone: 301-962-1400
Fees: Free
With the renovation of the Shops at Kenilworth (new stores and new pop-ups, including Rheb’s Homemade Candies), you can now see the train garden from 360 degrees. Seven trains include commuter, freight, and passenger trains that travel over more than 200 feet of track and nine bridges, all around the fountain at the mall. You’ll also see animations, displays, blinking lights, figure skaters, Santa sliding down a chimney, and other new and exciting attractions. The Train Group, which designed and created the layout, and the mall call it “Making Tracks to Kenilworth for the Holidays.”
Brookside Gardens
Address: 1800 Glenallan Ave., Wheaton, MD 20902
Hours: Open daily through Jan. 1, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. Closed Christmas Day. | Garden of Lights open Sunday – Thursday, 5:30 p.m. – 9 p.m. | Friday & Saturday, 5:30 p.m. – 10 p.m.
Photos: 301-962-1400
Fees: Conservatory admission, free | Garden of Lights admission, $25 per car on weeknights & $30 on weekends.
Make the garden railway exhibit one of your stops at Brookside Gardens' Garden of Lights: https://t.co/RbSgHnu9JX. #GardenOfLights2017 pic.twitter.com/HSM4gome08
— Montgomery Parks (@MontgomeryParks) November 29, 2017
The Washington, Virginia, and Maryland Garden Railway Society operates this garden — for the 13th year — inside the South Conservatory. G scale trains and trolleys traverse the miniature wintry landscape past a Dentzel Carousel, the Chautauqua Tower of Glen Echo Park, and the Conservatory itself, plus other Montgomery County landmarks. The Garden of Lights are awesome and in the shapes of animals, flowers, and natural elements.
Martinville Christmas Train & Plane Garden
Address: 701 Wilson Point Road, Ste. 5, Middle River, MD 21220
Hours: Open through Jan. 14, Wednesday – Saturday, 11 a.m. – 3 p..m. | Closed Christmas Day & New Year’s Day
Phone: 410-682-6122
Fees: Adults, $3 | Kids ages 6-12, $1
Perhaps the newest train garden in the area — it started in 2016 — this one combines trains and antique planes, so it’s easy to make both camps happy. This small layout includes some Martin aircraft and shouldn’t be overwhelming the way larger displays might be. The train exhibit is included in the museum admission.
Did we list your favorite train displays around Baltimore? Let us know in the comments below!
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