High costs at Thanksgiving Point drove the Ophir, Tintic and Western Train Club to find a different host for its Model Train Show last year.

And after a strong showing at the Spanish Fork Fairgrounds, the club determined the venue will be its new home going forward.

OT&W’s 34th annual Model Train Show returns April 4 from 3 to 9 p.m. and April 5 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. inside the fairgrounds’ indoor tennis courts.

“At the last minute, we had to move it down to Spanish Fork, and it was really successful,” said club secretary and train show committee member Phil Brueck. “We had a lot of people and so we’ve decided to hold it from there on.”

With 24,000 square feet spread across one floor, the building is fit to accommodate plenty of activities, and the club hopes to have something for everyone to enjoy this year.

The show will include 14 vendors and 11 model train layouts that will be scattered across the building along with several hands-on activities for kids to enjoy.

“We heard a lot of people say it’d be nice if we could have a few more things that were kind of interactive. So we have about five or six things like that for kids,” Brueck said.

There will be an “engineering school” for kids where they can learn how to be a train engineer, Brueck said. The event will also hold clinics where kids can learn how to build their own model train layouts and landscape designs and a place where they can run trains on a model track.

“Trains aren’t as romantic as they used to be when I was a kid,” Brueck said. “Kids now have electronics and they don’t (play with trains) that much. So we’re trying to appeal to a younger group as well, just to get them interested in it.”

There will also be plenty of train models on display.

OT&W will have two large models, N-scale and HO-scale tracks, while several individuals, other clubs and vendors will have their own smaller models displayed.

Each module will have a different theme, with some going heavy on the creative side. One train will resemble a lumber mill. Another is based around the state of Maine.

“The Wasatch Group even has a nuclear explosion in one of their modules,” Brueck said. “One of our guys did a winter scene where he is actually an ice skater that’s moving around on the ice, and there’s a car that’s wrecked in the ice, and police cars are there investigating the accident. There’s a real variety, and it gives everybody a chance to just have a fun time and do their own thing.”

Admission is $25 for a family, $10 for an adult and free for kids 8 and younger.