The casino model railway museum

Museum holding the Fry Collection, Malahide, Ireland

The Casino Model Railway Museum^[2][3] at Malahide, Ireland (previously called the Fry Model Railway) is the display home for the Fry Model Collection in the refurbished Casino cottage building in central Malahide. It opened to the public on 22 January ^[4][6]

The railway and collection was moved from its previous home in Malahide Castle in The collection originated from the work of Cyril Fry who had created the collection to run on his layout at his cottage in Churchtown, Dublin.

History[edit]

The layout and collection was created by the railway engineer and draughtsman Cyril Fry, an employee of Inchicore Works, and his family. The collection of models passed to Dublin Tourism in the s, following Mr Fry's death.^[7] Following work by retired CIÉ craftsman Thomas Tighe at Inchicore Works a new model railway was moved to Malahide Castle in , which operated with models made by other modellers, with the Fry collection on display in viewing cases.

Move from Malahide Castle[edit]

The exhibition was forced to be removed to storage for the redevelopment of Malahide Castle in following notice from the owners Fingal County Council.^[8] A 'Friends of the Fry Model Railway' association was formed and initial suggestions of where to relocate included Collins Barracks, Dublin.^[8] The only viable proposal to emerge was to re-open the railway at the basement Eblana Theatre in the Bus Éireann station in Dublin.^[9] An unexpected turn of events was that a wealthy farmer who died in January left a bequest of €m to restore the Casino House cottage near Malahide railway station but a condition of the legacy was that it be used to hold the Fry model railway exhibition.^[10]Fáilte Ireland initially wished to continue with the Bus Éireann option however this would have lost the conditions for the bequest.^[11] By April Fingal County Council determined to accept the bequest and the incumbent transport minister Leo Varadkar indicated he was delighted the matter was resolved.^[7] In a Malahide/Howth area committee meeting in June councillors expressed frustrations over the delays but that matters concerning heritage buildings were complex and of the need to meet the constraints of the funding bequest.^[12]

In September the exhibition was expected to re-open in following refurbishment of the 'Casino' cottage building near Malahide railway station.^[13] By the end of April some progress had been made with the tendering process complete and the contractor having commenced on site with extension and refurbishment of the Casino Cottage to complete in February with public opening expected Spring ^[14][15] October saw the plan broadly on the course of the September timetable to re-open in early in Malahide following the refurbishment and extension of the Casino building.^{[16][17][14][18]} However reported expected costs rose through from € million to € million^[15][19] and on to € million.^[18] In May the work on the Casino building was stated as complete and re-opening was scheduled for Autumn ^[20][3] In August Shannon Heritage was appointed operator for the facility, seemingly termed the Casino Model Railway Museum, with official opening remaining to be expected "later this year".^[2]

Casino House[edit]

Casino House was built around ^[21] though some claims date it earlier to the late 17th century.^[7][22] It is a two-story thatched house with eight bays.^[21] It was a shooting lodge for the Talbot family (though some have suggested a romantic summer house^[7]) and remained with the family until ^[22] The building had been allowed to deteriorate.^[12][23][24] May saw the building renovated and extended to house the railway museum and collection.^[20][3]

Fry collection[edit]

The Fry collection includes hand-built models of Irish features, stations and trains represents Irish railway heritage since the about the s.^[8][16] While the O gauge models were usually very accurate the Drumm Battery Train model appears to have been taken from preliminary drawings incorporating streamlined ends which did not appear in the actual train.^[25][26] A figure of about rail vehicles is mentioned.^[19][b]

Steam locomotive models[edit]

Railcars and trams[edit]

Casino layout[edit]

The new layout is expected to be able to run six trains simultaneously.^[35] There will be about hand-built carriages and locomotives.^[35][f] The new layout is on an 11m x 4m table (44 square metres (&#;sq&#;ft)) with additional trains running on overhead tracks.^[4] The main basis of the running display layout is a double loop oval with single track round Bray Head at one end and Dublin city represented at the thisisnl.nl railway station in County Cork and the local Malahide station are represented on the sides; while a single track loops overhead.

The Casino incorporates an educational centre available to groups of scholars.^[4]

Previous layouts[edit]

Churchtown[edit]

The original layout evolved in Cyril Fry's own home, and he originally called it "The Irish International Railway and Tramway System".

Malahide Castle[edit]

A dedicated O gauge display was set up at Malahide Castle in June after being prepared at Inchicore from the early s. It was a working miniature rail display that grew to 2, square feet (&#;m²).^[16] The core design of the layout consisted of three double track loops encircling the control area in the middle. One end of the layout depicted Dublin with the opposite corners representing Cork and Belfast.^[8] Even an Irish Sea mail Packet boat was represented in the background.^[8] In between various scenes of Irish rail scenes through the ages were depicted.

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

References[edit]

External links[edit]