Looking for a hands-on experience that you can’t get anywhere else? We’re the only place in the Greater Toronto Area where you can get behind the controls of a locomotive. Our train simulator transports you back to the Toronto Rail Lands in the 1950s, which you can explore freely. Firstly, museum staff will give you a tutorial on the basics of how to operate a diesel locomotive. From there, you will travel through Toronto and encounter many famous landmarks like Union Station, and the John Street Roundhouse.
How our Train Simulator Works
Our train simulator uses the program Trainz 2010, which is customized especially for the Toronto Railway Museum. Museum staff and volunteers built the simulator using real locomotive parts. Similarly, to build the course, our volunteers spent hundreds of hours building digital objects from scratch and incorporating them into the Trainz program. For more background information, visit our TRHA blog page here.
Special Simulator Programs
We also use the Toronto Rail Lands course to interpret railway history. Our newest way of this is a special program called Connect the Canadian.
Connect the Canadian will put the visitor in the role of a rail-yard switcher. Firstly, they will be responsible for connecting the cars that make up a passenger train. For instance, the train that you will build is the famous Canadian Pacific Railway train the Canadian. The Canadian was used by the Canadian Pacific Railway for people to travel across Canada, from either Montreal or Toronto out to Vancouver (for more information on this train, click here). Secondly, after connecting the cars together, you will switch to the main locomotive and connect it to the cars, creating a train! Finally, if you are able to connect the train together without crashing, you can drive for the remainder of your time.
Please keep in mind that these simulator events are subject to availability and are typically held during the winter months. Therefore, to stay in the loop, follow us on social media or sign up for our newsletter.