LEGO Set Review - Bricktober Train Station 40142

Ahh, October. Full of leaves and pumpkins and overpriced Toys'R'Us sets. We're cruising through Bricktober 2015 and looking at this year's second promo, the Train Station.

Sort of.

There are several things wrong with this set. Primarily it's the shortest line ever. At 8 studs it's little more than the two cars that fit on the track. It takes more time to queue up than it does to ride it. At least that's the presumption. Sneaking a peek at the back of the box, there's no connections to be made unless the sidewalk spontaneously turns into track. The platform has two signs on it. Both ends of the line? "How far are you going?" "To the end of this fence." But at least the track is dark pearl grey, not just a normal grey!

Second, these things seem to be growing. Last year all of the modules were 6 studs wide and 8 studs deep. This year's hotel is 8x8. But it's a corner module so that kind of make sense, kind of. This train station is 10 studs wide.

Wut?

The draw of the large modular sets is that they are all standardized to a 32x32 baseplate. This means they can be mixed and matched and still all set up nicely. Now in the real world, I understand that building lots can be different sizes. Most often (where I live) they are 50x100' but anomalies happen. Maybe they'll be 60' or 75' wide. So I get the aspect of injecting a little bit of realism. But this is microscale LEGO where the scale is no longer 1:1. Now we're about 1:480. There's not a lot of wiggle room for subtle variation while still staying within a larger uniformity.

Therefore, I decided to redesign my Train Station to be 8 studs wide. But now that I've built it and shot it I realize it still doesn't solve the problem of the shortest ride ever. I think I need to make it 8 studs wide and 10 studs deep so the train track is actually out in the right of way. Then maybe I can expand the track and make it travel all around the town.

But despite these problems there are a few redeeming things about the set. Namely, trans-clear, dark green and roller-skate, roller-skate, ROLLER-SKATE!

By the way, if you would, please petition Great Ole's ghost that I would be able to obtain the next two Bricktober sets. I'd hate to lose out on one and, well, you'd hate to miss a review.