Awe yes, it's tops

SO WHAT makes a great museum? If it's simply the wow factor, the NRM has oodles of the stuff. Just stand at the entrance to the Great Hall and gape. Ranged inside are a series of metal monsters from the great age of steam: everything from a reproduction of Stephenson's Rocket, the most famous train, to the Mallard, the fastest steam loco ever, to the behemoth that is the Chinese locomotive.

To stand in this vast hall, is to feel humbled and insignificant in the face of these mighty man-made monsters.

"It's the sheer scale of it that's awesome," says Camilla Harrison, the museum's press and PR manager, as she takes me on a whirlwind tour.

It's hard not to agree. But it's only when those first feelings of awe have begun to subside that the visitor can begin to take in some of the subtler attractions of this marvellous museum.

Standing on the cool concrete next to the Mallard, the next thing to strike you is that all this is real. There's the smell of engine oil for a start. And touch the shining metal skin or peer beneath the gleaming, well-oiled wheels of any of these machines, and it soon becomes clear they aren't cheap, flashy reproductions. They're the real McCoy, down to the last, precision-engineered lever or piston rod.

What makes it even more special is that they are so accessible. "You can walk around at your leisure, explore, look underneath them, touch them," says Camilla, doing exactly that.

"Other museums have to put things behind glass cases for security reasons. But because we have such giant exhibits, you can really get up close and personal."

For Nick Winterbotham, the NRM's deputy head of museum, it's precisely the way visitors can get up 'close and personal' like this that makes the museum such a winner.

He admits it is basically a one story museum - the story of the railways. But within that are countless smaller stories. The development of steam power, the building of the railways, the great age of rail travel - even, according to one national newspaper, the "erotic effect of uneven 19th century rails".

All these stories are here, just waiting to be uncovered. Nick says it makes the museum a place where visitors can go on a journey of personal discovery.

One of the great stories is that of Stephenson's Rocket. There are two reproductions of the Rocket here - and even older locomotives, clumsy, lumbering monsters that could manage just a few miles an hour.

Camilla Harrison says rail was originally seen as a way of transporting coal. It was only later that railway owners wised up to the fact it could carry people, too. At first passengers were very much a secondary consideration: they could hitch a ride, if there was room.

Then, in 1829, work began on the first inter-city line from Liverpool to Manchester. Trains were too slow, unreliable and inefficient for passenger transport so directors of the Liverpool to Manchester company put out a challenge - and a prize of £500 to anyone able to improve on the existing locomotives. The ground-breaking Rocket was the result - completing a 70-mile test course at an average speed of 13mph.

It's hard to imagine today the awe this feat inspired, says Camilla.

"It's as if somebody brought out a car today which could triple the speed you could go on the road, but in complete safety," she says.

Another story just waiting to be discovered at the museum is that of rail time. Back in the mid-1850s, because there was no radio, no TV, no instant form of communication, time varied in different parts of the country. In Plymouth, says Camilla, the time could be 20 minutes different from London, because nobody had any way of comparing.

Then along came the trains - and they brought London time with them. It was as if the whole nation was suddenly able to synchronise watches. For a while, local time and London time co-existed uneasily side by side: then in 1880, an Act of Parliament made Greenwich Mean Time the legal time for the whole of Britain.

It's a great little story, which brings home the transforming effect the railways had on Victorian England. None of the above, though, is what has enabled the NRM to pick up this year's top museum accolade - the museum world's version of the best film Oscar, if you like.

The judges in Pisa who named it European Museum Of The Year on Saturday night certainly referred to the museum's ability to humanise its story, and the way it puts such a large number of objects on show for visitors to touch.

But they referred to something more - the museum's spirit of innovation, exemplified by its new £4 million wing, The Works, opened in 1999.

The Works, as never before, takes you behind the scenes at the museum. It is organised into three 'galleries'. The first is a giant balcony overlooking the museum's workshop. There are video films, hands-on displays and other gadgetry - but the main aim is to allow visitors, with the help of strategically-mounted CCTV cameras, to observe actual restoration and conservation work going on in the workshop below.

Next comes a gallery devoted to running the railways. There is a hands-on signal-box, NRM Central, where you can become a signalman: and even better, a live link-up with the real signalling network. On a bank of computer screens, you can watch the progress of trains approaching York railway station as the signals switch to allow them through - then, by rushing out onto a viewing balcony with an unparalleled view of the approaches to the station itself, see them as they pull in.

Finally, there is the warehouse. Here, for the first time, visitors can roam freely among some of the museum's thousands upon thousands of 'reserve collection' items - material that, before, would never have seen the light of day. It is, says Camilla, a veritable Aladdin's Cave of treasures, from station signs and numberplates to the frieze of Britannia that once hung outside Euston Station and a breathtaking private collection of more than 600 hand-crafted trains and carriages that hangs along one wall.

There's no doubt that it's The Works which really swung the vote the NRM's way.

The judges' citation says it all.

"In general, transport museums are relatively slow to adapt their exhibition methods to the demands of today's public," the judges said. "(But) the museum has done an excellent job in showing visitors of all ages its workshop and restoration skills.

"The museum has also made full use of its location, and visitors are now able to watch incoming trains on computer screens and then step outside to see them pass from a balcony overlooking the East Coast Main Line.

"With its interactive displays, numerous activities and very high standard of visitor care, the museum is now full of ideas which can be taken up in part by transport museums of any size."

Amen to that.

Updated: 10:30 Tuesday, May 22, 2001