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Take a ride on the world’s largest model train set in Google Street View, if you dare

Take a ride on the world’s largest model train set in Google Street View, if you dare

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I am smitten with Hamburg's Miniatur Wunderland, and I think you will be too. The world's largest model railway fills a 13,000-square-meter layout with 13 kilometers of tracks and hundreds of thousands of tiny people, vehicles, buildings, natural attractions, and of course trains. Over a million people visited the tourist attraction each year, but now we can gaze at the set from home through Google Street View.

Unlike the human-sized Street View camera, Google collaborated with Ubilabs to create an appropriately miniature version of the device. While the itty-bitty camera appears cute at our scale, imagine how horrific a real world version of this robo-cyclops would look zipping down your street.

Google Street View
Google Street View

The Miniatur Wunderland set features moving trains, along with cruise shops, shipping vehicles, airplanes that land and take off, firetrucks that respond to smoky buildings, and police that pull over speeding vehicles. I mean, criminently, it has a flying saucer!

The display is overflowing with surprising little moments, that will make your heart flutter with joy and oh God what is Death doing here?!

Google Street View

Of course you should wander to Wunderland on your own via Street View, but be sure to enjoy this video tour, too: