You are right - I am not bothered about that. Why? because it wont appeal to the target audience. Build me that point mechanism into a hands on display about railway signalling that lets people pull the levers and see something happen, explain why it is important and what happens if you get it wrong and we might be on to something.
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You are, of course, correct, but enthusiasts DO have that knowledge which they develop at the expense of almost everything else and struggle to understand why others don't take it that seriously. That isn't just train people but cars, planes, records, books etc
What an excellent suggestion. That would be a fascinating exhibit for all ages I think. I'm an enthusiast and visit the NRM a few times a year just to enjoy getting up close and personal to locomotives and stock, which are the real focus of my railway fascination. But even though I make sure I cover every inch of the museum, I find the Signalling display in the gallery above the workshop incredibly boring. I'd like to learn a bit more about signalling but it's just an overwhelming wall of text and images that don't all necesarily correspond to what's written nearby. It's not clear, or easy to tackle. There are a couple of 'interactive' items but they're more or less permanently faulty or just outright broken.
As someone who grew up as this kind of interactive museum emerged, going to places like
Techniquest when I was a kid (not strictly a museum but broadly similar to how museums are going), I'm sceptical about whether the theories behind this type of learning actually work. Are kids really learning, or are they just having fun pushing all the buttons? I remember having fun in Techniquest as a kid, running around playing with exhibits, but did I learn anything? I doubt it. Would I be cynical to think that this may primarily be about creating an easy time for the adults, letting the kids off the leash to play in a safe indoor environment while also giving them the credibility of having taken them to a museum, even if they don't actually learn much? Possibly, but there may also be a grain of truth in it
Absolutely. I would appear to be approximately the same age as this poster! I've been similar places with kids in the recent past, and they want to press a button and see something happen like they do on an iPad but they don't want to know what they're actually seeing or how and why it works and/or is important. I think I was the same as a kid - my interest was railways, so in a museum that wasn't about railways or didn't contain anything railway-related (such as the media museum, which, with the exception of the green-screen flying carpet I found deathly boring), I just wanted to see what things did if I pressed/moved them. Didn't care what or why.
That said, I don't think the Soyuz capsule being there is a good idea - in the same way the big wheel wasn't. The reason for this is the NRM will always have a fairly fixed audience regardless of how it's set up - it's one of those things which you're either interested in or you're not. There's no point catering for people who don't want to go there, because even if they do end up going there (e.g. as part of a family or school trip), you need that baseline enthusiasm to engage with something. You can make it as plain and accessible as you like but if people don't care, they're not going to engage with it. Putting a spacecraft on display there to get a few more people in there who wouldn't otherwise have gone in as a short-term boost is purely a cynical move to inflate the figures, and I don't think it really proves anything. It just means you get stuck in a cycle of having to do this again and again to keep the figures up
I can see and understand the logic behind both sides of the argument, but I think this is more or less how I feel about it. It made sense to display it at the Bradford Museum as it's now 'Science
and Media'. But surely if people from York wanted to see the capsule, they would just as easily have gone to Bradford to see it, just as anyone from Bradford who wishes to see 60103 in their region would be able travel to York. It's not really that far, even on public transport, and the only benefit to the museum is numbers through the door. If people were bothered about the railways, they'd come to the museum anyway.
Back in the day, the area around the turntable was full - all around where the Paramedic Train and by the window was full of engines. There are a lot more gaps now - and the BR exhibit and Azuma cab take up space too. It feels a lot more spaced out compared to how it was
Is the fake Eurostar cab still there as well as the Eurostar power car? Surely now they've got the real thing, the mockup needs to go. It takes up a huge amount of space and I don't think it really has much effect.
The biggest problem for me is the Station Hall. It doesn't quite work as either a recreation of a station OR an exhibition space. I think it's pretty naff now.
In the past, to view the Royal Train vehicles you walked along a carpeted row with the stock either side, one row headed by the gleaming LMS 5000, with little video booths talking about the history and development of the RT and I think bunting or something overhead - combined with low lighting it gave you the impression you were really following in the footsteps of royals as you wandered down there. Now, whilst Gladstone is arguably an even more fitting locomotive, the rest is just three coaches with minimal explanation or focus.
I think you
could make it brilliant. You can appeal to the average punter not just with 'celebrity' locos but by invoking nostalgia; having a parcels-type train at one platform, an 'express'-type train at another and maybe a platform with the 2-BIL and a cosmetically restored first-gen DMU would show a realistic cross section of the traffic at a terminus through the years but with the effect of appealing to the average punters by recreating what they'd have known when they were younger. Last time I went with my Dad, he remembered EMUs similar to the 2-BIL and enjoyed sharing his memories of childhood even though he's no enthusiast.
I'd personally love to see the 86 with the Mk2 pullman it currently sits with plus a MK3 SLEP open for visitors to walk through. But I don't think that would appeal to many others!
I fully agree with your position.
I don't want to offend anyone, and I'm not saying this applies to anyone on this thread, but my observation is that many railway enthusiasts are old, crusty, or just plain weird and lack the people skills to attract interest from a new generation.
Yep - I see this too. Took my dad to a gala a few years ago at a local railway celebrating a significant anniversary with a gala featuring engines with a lot of local history. Ended up feeling like we were the only two 'normal' people on the train and was rather put off by the lack of attention paid by some to their presentation and personal hygiene.