GoodGymers from Ealing and Hounslow combined their engineering greatness this morning to create a huge train track for autistic and SEND children to play with and interact with each other. Not only were they "doing engineering", they were also surrounded by engineering marvels as All Aboard Club are trialling the Transport Museum Depot in Acton as a new location. That's pretty awesome 🚇

The group helped unload the last boxes from task owner Richard's car and entered the building to see where they'd be ~~playing~~ working. As they climbed the stairs, they found themselves on a mezzanine level, looking over the historic tube trains in the depot. Exciting for both the volunteers and attendees.

The mezzanine area was big, so it was good that there were 10 people to build the track. Like the children attending, they worked by themselves, then over time, they connected their islands of track to other islands and soon, the whole floor was covered.

As the loose ends were being tied up, the first children started arriving. Sevan joined Richard and the Depot staff in guiding the children and parents in through the gift shop, trying to keep them from being distracted, past the big trains, up the stairs and to the small trains for them to play with. Emmanuella, Gus, Alan and Steph stayed upstairs to help the children and parents, maybe having time to set a few tank engines puffing around the track themselves.

Today was another opportunity to play with All Aboard Club's giant train set for Madhan and Sevan. All Aboard Club had 2 first timer volunteers too, which led Richard, the task owner, to say that Sevan was the most experienced volunteer and could guide the others in building an awesome track layout. gulp 😅

The group started slowly, getting to grips with building the track, then by half way through it was full speed ahead, with each of their islands being joined together to make a layout that spread all around the room.

"I'm here for All Aboard Club"

...said someone who poked their head through the door. The group hoped that it was one of the missing volunteers, but it was actually a parent who was very early.

Soon, Richard announced that there were only 10 minutes to go. Time to start tying up all the loose ends of track, grafting them into the existing layout. Almost everyone tried to simplify, except for one person whose track was branching out instead. That was sorted just in time for the first child to arrive.

"Look, there's a giant house!" - first child

The first child in stepped right over the train track and went to the wooden play house at the back of the room and completely ignored the 1 hour art installation. That wasn't the reaction that was expected. Richard said that that wasn't unusual and the train set would grab their interest soon enough.

Steph, Michelle and Sevan were one rail engineer light this morning for GoodGym Ealing's early service. Still, they were excited to be helping All Aboard Club to create a fun yet complicated train track layout for SEND and autistic children to play with.

There were 6 volunteers in total to get creative with 7 big boxes full of track pieces, bridges and rolling stock. One of the volunteers even looked like a pro, bringing their own knee pads. Steph and Sevan went straight into building their own mini railways, while Michelle, whose first time it was with All Aboard Club, was given some track building advice before getting stuck in too.

Between the volunteers, they managed to put together:

• An never ending loop, guaranteed to result in poor passenger satisfaction scores
• A tourist branch, taking a scenic loop of a corridor outside the main hall
• Double and triple bridges!

Once they'd linked their individual pieces, they thought they were done. Then task owner Richard asked them to go even bigger, so they did.

Track laying was completed right before the first train driver (and imaginary, fare paying passengers) burst through the doors. They were super excited and the first thing they wanted to do... was change the track layout with their own modifications. Everyone's an critic 😂. That was the cue for the GoodGymers to leave, before all their hard work was remixed and ripped apart.

Today was the first day of service by All Aboard Club to The Log Cabin in Northfields. The purpose of the service is to allow neurodiverse children to interact through playing with a giant train set. This includes resolving train scheduling errors where Thomas the tank engine and a TGV happen to find themselves speeding towards each other on the same stretch of track.

Kash, Steph Ducat, Ijo and Sevan were part of a 9 person track engineering team, preparing the set before the children's arrival. They and the regular All Aboard Club volunteers were playing too and like the neurodiverse children, worked by themselves at times until they encountered someone else's bit of track. They then had to work with the other track engineer to make the 2 parts fit together.

Unlike many large scale British engineering projects, it all came together perfectly and on time. It was even on budget (a.k.a. free)! Bridges, branches, tunnels and stations were all ready for the excited train drivers to experience.

Before leaving, Sevan tried to inhale some sultanas to power him onto the next task in Southall. A couple of them dropped and landed on the track, almost causing a catastrophic derailment. Luckily the Chief Engineer, Richard, saved the day by clearing the line. Phew!