"I always thought it was impossible to drive Formula 1 cars in Wunderland in a realistic race. That's exactly what made the idea so appealing,” said Gerrit Braun, joint founder of Miniatur Wunderland. The new 22-metre-long racetrack is based on so-called Halbach arrays, 24 track boards, 90 control boards and 90 locating boards. Electronically generated, punctual magnetic fields move along the track to control the racing cars individually. Landmarks including the old town, Monaco-Ville, the famous Ozeaneum, St. Nicholas Cathedral and the Prince’s Palace have been recreated in minute detail. “Monaco certainly caters to many clichés and the construction has taught us once again that the truth and the cliché are not always congruent. But sometimes they are,” said Frederik Braun, joint founder of Miniatur Wunderland.
The principality of Monaco and its Formula 1 racketrack are the latest marvellous (1:87 scale) additions to Miniatur Wunderland's model railway in Hamburg. The Monaco section comes after eleven years of work, over 150,000 working hours and at a cost of EUR 5 million and after the addition of the Latin America section in 2023.
Formula 1 circuit and luxury yachts
Miniatur Wunderland top tourist attraction
More than a million hours of work have gone into the Miniatur Wunderland, bringing the total length of track to over 16,000 metres. The Monaco and Provence section will be followed by the rainforest with the Amazon and Andes in 2025/2026 and the Caribbean in 2027. The Braun brothers also plan to add parts of Asia later. Founded in 2001, the model railway in Hamburg’s Speicherstadt is one of Germany’s most popular attractions.
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