New York Insider Tours: All Aboard! Garden’s Train Show Is Sure to Impress

"All Aboard!" That's the call that beckons visitors to the New York Botanical Garden's Holiday Train Show. It was my first time to the exhibit, now in its 19th year, and I can assure you that it didn't disappoint.

Nestled in the warmth of the Garden's Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, this year's show boasts 140 replicas of New York landmarks – made entirely of natural materials, including tree bark, leaves and pinecones – by which a quarter-mile of track is crisscrossed by model trains and trolleys.

New to this year's exhibit is a recreation of the Trans World Airlines Flight Center at John F. Kennedy International Airport, originally designed by Eero Saarinen. Complete with a runway, Boeing 747 and helicopter, it greets visitors near the show's start.

From there, the impressive line-up of landmark replicas keeps coming, including St. Patrick's Cathedral, with organ music emanating from within; the original Pennsylvania Station, built in the Beaux Arts style with a view into the train tracks underneath; the original Yankees stadium, complete with a board for the batting order, dugouts and - my personal favorite – stadium lights made of willow twigs and acorn tops; and Rockefeller Center, with its world-renown tree and trumpeting angels. Overhead replicas of the city's bridges, including the George Washington Bridge and Brooklyn Bridge, zigzag throughout the exhibit. All of the miniature landmarks are handcrafted by Paul Busse and his team at Applied Imagination in Alexandria, Ky., using natural materials that have been collected year-round. (Check out photos from the show below.)

As for the trains, the exhibit showcases more than a dozen G-scale trains; "G" meaning garden, according to a sign on the way in. They traverse the spectrum of railcar advances from late-1800s steam engines to today's high-speed passenger trains. For those with children, rest easy that Thomas the Tank Engine has earned a place among the fleet and was quite the attraction for the younger set during my visit.

Now to the details of getting onboard: The show opened Nov. 20 and runs through Jan. 9, 2011. The Garden is open every day except Monday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and has extended hours on select Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays as well as during holiday weeks. Tickets range from $20 to $25 for adults and $10 to $15 for children, with discounts for seniors and students and children under the age of 2 free. If you're purchasing tickets online, be sure to know about what time you plan to get there as selecting a time is required.

And to get a jump-start on your visit, the Garden's website has a neat landmark map that shows the actual locations of the replicas in the show, complete with the option to check out a full image of the replica and see what natural materials were used in its construction.

Enjoy the show!