Uzbekistan is primarily known for one thing – the Silk Road. When you picture Uzbekistan, immediately to mind comes the ancient cities of Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva with their phenomenal monuments and splendid architecture. Traversing the small alleyways of these historical masterpieces one is transported back to the time of Amir Timur and Alexander the Great.
Because of this, Tashkent, and other places of interest of Central Asia’s most populous ‘Stan’ are often overlooked. Tashkent is a modern cosmopolitan city with a plethora of sites to see, bustling markets, fascinating museums, vibrant cafes, and beautiful parks.
For a really different experience, the railway museum in Tashkent is a great few hours. Officially called the Tashkent Museum of Railway Techniques (in Uzbek: Toshkent Temiryo'l Texnikasi Muzeyi), and it’s located just near the main Tashkent Railway Station and the metro station named ‘Tashkent’.
Great for kids or those who are children at heart, you can explore and climb over the dozens of train engines and carriages until your heart is content.
Opened in 1989, 100 years after the first railway line was built in Central Asia, the museum contains dozens of rare and unique trains from all over the former Eastern Bloc, not just the Soviet Union, including the Polish Peoples Republic, Czechoslovakia and there is even a captured Nazi train and an American steam engine.
For Sovietophiles, the trains all contain amazing soviet emblems, hammers and sickles a plenty, profiles of Lenin and Stalin, and plenty of red stars.
The Tashkent Railway Museum isn’t just a fun few hours exploring these amazing machines, but also helps tell the story of Central Asia. It was railways such as the Turksib (Turkestan-Siberian Railway) which opened up Central Asia to the world. Railways became the lifelines of Central Asia firstly during the Russian Empire and then during the Soviet Union (USSR). Railway provided both modernity and progress to the region as well as allowing for more effective central control from Moscow, some no doubt considering it a curse as well as the blessing.
If you’ve got a few days in Tashkent, the railway museum is well worth the visit and is only about $1USD to enter. Make sure you visit on a good day (although Tashkent rarely gets bad weather) as the entire museum is open air.
