Micro-Trains - 993 01 500 - Passenger Train, Diesel, North American, Transition Era - Napa Valley Wine Train - 4-pack

Specific Item Information: The Micro-Trains N scale Napa Valley Wine Train Set consists of:
- Parlor cars: Le Petit Gourmet, Merlot and Zinfadel plus Observation car, Chardonnay
Each is decorated in the colorful metallic gold, maroon and green Napa Valley Wine Train colors.

Model Information: Micro-trains Table Top sets are boxed sets that contain working locomotives. Sets that contain only rolling stock (and dummy units) are considered normal "Runner Packs" for this classification purpose.

Table Top Sets may or may not contain track and/or a transformer.

Prototype History: The transition era (1939 - 1957) was the heyday for passenger rail. The industrial boom triggered by the second world war created tremendous capacity for production which was no longer needed for war production. The North American factories turned to consumer goods and services and the rail system was a major recipient of this ouput.

The interstate highways system as we know it now was still a thing of the future and long distance travel by highway was simply not practical and aircraft travel was still a luxury for the well-to-do. People traveled the country by rail and there was a huge variety of railroads and services available to the traveler. Innovation was constant, and the materials and machinery employed by the railroads was evolving as fast as the engineers could think of new things to entice the fickle consumer to ride a particular route or particular service.

This all came to an end when the automobile and airplane replaced the passenger train as the preferred vehicles of transportation in the 1960s.

Road Name History: The Napa Valley Wine Train located in northern California is operated by the Napa Valley Railroad which is a privately owned excursion train that runs 36-miles round trip between Napa and St. Helena. The wine train has been in operation since 1989 and now has 4 engines and 10 heavyweight passenger cars. The majority of the cars used by the train were originally built in 1915 by Pullman Standard for Northern Pacific Railway. The train has a capacity of 370 passengers and has carried over two million passengers since 1989!

Read more on Wikipedia.

Brand/Importer Information: Micro-Trains is the brand name used by both Kadee Quality Products and Micro-Trains Line. For a history of the relationship between the brand and the two companies, please consult our Micro-Trains Collector's Guide.

Manufacturer Information: Micro-Trains Line split off from Kadee Quality Products in 1990. Kadee Quality Products originally got involved in N-Scale by producing a scaled-down version of their successful HO Magne-Matic knuckle coupler system. This coupler was superior to the ubiquitous 'Rapido' style coupler due to two primary factors: superior realistic appearance and the ability to automatically uncouple when stopped over a magnet embedded in a section of track. The success of these couplers in N-Scale quickly translated to the production of trucks, wheels and in 1972 a release of ready-to-run box cars.

Micro-Trains Line Co. split off from Kadee in 1990 to form a completely independent company. For this reason, products from this company can appear with labels from both enterprises. Due to the nature of production idiosyncrasies and various random factors, the rolling stock from Micro-Trains can have all sorts of interesting variations in both their packaging as well as the products themselves. When acquiring an MTL product it is very important to understand these important production variations that can greatly enhance (or decrease) the value of your purchase.

Please consult our Micro-Trains Collector's Guide