Rail transport modelling

A Japanese H0e scale model railroad
One of the smallest (Z scale, 1:220) placed on the buffer bar of one of the larger (live steam, 1:8) model locomotives
HO scale (1:87) model of a North American center cab switcher shown with a pencil for scale
Z scale (1:220) scene of a 2-6-0 steam locomotive being turned. A scratch-built Russell snow plow is parked on a stub (Val Ease Central Railroad).

Railway modelling (British English) or model railroading (US and Canada) is a hobby in which rail transport systems are modelled at a reduced scale.

The earliest model railways were the carpet railways in the 1840s. The first documented model railway was the Railway of the Prince Imperial (French: Chemin de fer du Prince Impérial), built in 1859 by Emperor Napoleon III for his then three-year-old son, also Napoleon, in the grounds of the Château de Saint-Cloud in Paris. It was powered by clockwork and ran in a figure-of-eight.

The world's oldest working model railway is a model designed to train signalmen on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway. It is located in the National Railway Museum, in York, England, and dates back to 1912; it remained in use until 1995. The model was built as a training exercise by apprentices of the company's Horwich Works and supplied with rolling stock by Bassett-Lowke.

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