The following is a copy
of the information being provided to Children’s hospital of
Pittsburgh regarding PGRS’ involvement with the Hospital. The
pictures below show the building of the layout.
The Pittsburgh Garden Railway Society
is a family oriented group of people who enjoy activities associated
with garden railroading, gardening, creating outdoor model train
layouts, running trains, and sharing our ideas and knowledge with
others.
The organization
was founded in the fall of 1994. And yes, we do run our trains
outside, sometimes even in the snow.
PGRS first built
a “G-scale” railroad for the patients of the Children’s Hospital of
Pittsburgh in the fall of 1998. That layout was modified and
updated and remained in operation until the closing of the Oakland
campus. Computer monitoring of the Oakland layout revealed the
display was activated on average a hundred times a day at all hours
of the day and night. The heavy use necessitated replacing the
brass track several times over its years of operation. This layout
had a circus theme with a single loop of track and recorded music
that played as the circus train ran.
In addition to
building the permanent display, PGRS has also set up a temporary
Christmas display at the hospital.
The new layout
at the Lawrenceville Campus of Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh is
nearly twice the size of the old layout. It features a larger loop
of track with a Heartland “2-4-4 Princess” locomotive and coaches.
There is also a “point to point” track for a replica of Mr. Rodgers
Trolley built by one of our members. The trolley trestle
constructed by another one of our members contains a thousand pieces
of wood. Multiple themes, a circus, a playground, and a zoo are
presented using Playmobil characters and models. The display has a
number of custom animations including a merry-go-round, an elephant,
and prairie dogs. Each of these has individual sound recordings
that are activated with the animation. In addition to the
electronic enhancement, this layout uses stainless steel track which
will delay the necessity of replacing the rails.
Approximately 40
members volunteered over 700 hours of time to complete this display.
For more
information on the Pittsburgh Garden Railway Society please visit
our web site: http://pittsburghgardentrains.com/
The Pittsburgh
Garden Railway Society members are very pleased to have once again
had the opportunity to brighten the lives of the children who use
the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.
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