Train ride
amusement ride consisting of small trains
A train ride or miniature train consists of miniature trains capable of carrying people. Some are considered amusement rides and some are located in amusement parks and municipal parks. Backyard railroads, ridable miniature railways, and large amusement railways run on tracks, and especially if the service is provided by a non-commercial hobbyist club, their trains may be exact scale models, often with a live steam locomotive. Some train rides are kiddie rides, which are commercial children's rides that often use simple, colorful equipment with the driving mechanism hidden under vacuum-formed plastic covers. Trackless trains do not use tracks and usually consist of railroad-like cars towed behind an ordinary, or modified motor vehicle. This type of ride is often used for sightseeing tours. Some roller coasters like the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad attractions in several Disney parks resemble train rides, but may not be available to children under a certain age or minimum height.
History
One of the earliest manufacturers of train rides were the Cagney Brothers, who began making miniature steam locomotives in 1894. They incorporated the Miniature Railway Company in 1898.
Another early maker of miniature train rides was Paul Allen Sturtevant, who began building model trains as rides for children in the 1930s.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Train ride” as amusement ride consisting of small trains. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as amusement ride consisting of small trains. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 17, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q1259114. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1894 and 1898.
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This entry incorporates text from “Train ride” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.