Grayland Station

09/14/09

Best place for diecast aircraft in Chicagoland

by MishaK at Citysearch

In addition to being a mecca for model train aficionados, Grayland Station is *the* place in the Chicagoland area for diecast aircraft. Steve has piles and piles and buckets full of Gemini, Dragon, Herpa, AV400 & AV200, Inflight and many others. But you will need time. Nothing is organized and you will need to sift through the piles to find what you're looking for.

• Pros: great finds
• Cons: An organizational mess

02/16/08

Best little train store in the Metro Region.

by Railking at Citysearch

This place is simply stocked to the gills. Absolutely everything a self-respecting train nerd needs in N/HO scales is all right here. (Honest!) Train stores like this do not exist anymore. Most have a few displays and no stock. Most times if you want something particular you've got to order it online or through your local vendor. Not at Grayland Station. Its a rare event if you can not find what you want. There are no displays and it is all stock - everywhere. While there are some other gauges and airplane stuff it is really an N-HO show.

But - take your time. Like Doctor Who's Tardis, you will not believe how much is stuffed into this little store. Don't bring the kids or your wife. The kids will knock down piles of stock and the wife will divorce you for finally proving yourself to be the uber-nerd she's long suspected you of being.

It helps if you know what you are looking for and then ask the owner Steve (very polite, nice, helpful guy) to find it for you. Even if what you want is seven inches from your own nose (and blinking) it is highly unlikely you'll see it. Then there's overload - you will be blown away by being surrounded by (consumed by?) all of the trains and it will be hard to concentrate.

Other train stores like to pretend they have stock - Grayland Station is the Terminator of Model Railroad stock. It's better than the Internet - more stock - and cheaper - no postage. This is a place where you can look at road name after road name of SD40's(for example) from Athern/Genesis, Intermountain, Proto, et. al.. Whatever you need you can go, compare and get it at Grayland, the last bit of MRR whistlestop heaven on earth. If you're lucky, Steve's nameless older brother will be in to B.S. a bit. He's a secret rivet counter that can whir off the difference between an F7 and an FP7 by dimension and by equipment inventory without pausing so much for a breath.

• Pros: Jammed to the ceiling with stuff. It's got everything you need or want and a lot of what you never knew was there. Off of the Metra station. Parking all around.
• Cons: Jammed to the ceiling with stuff. You have to move slowly. There's zero displays b/c there's stock everywhere. Know what you want before you get there.