Swiss Museum of Transport

01 In brief

When Switzerland's transport industry could not find a home in Zurich for a national transport museum, the city of Lucerne offered a lakeside plot — and on 1 July 1959 the Verkehrshaus der Schweiz opened its doors. It grew out of an association founded in 1942 by the federal railways, the postal service and private transport, trade, industry and tourism organisations, and it has become, by its own account, Switzerland's most-visited museum, reporting more than one million admissions a year.

The museum's specialism is breadth. Eight themed areas cover rail transport, road transport, aviation and space travel, navigation, cableways and tourism, energy, media and an outdoor area, joined by the Hans Erni Museum, a planetarium, a large-format film theatre and the Swiss Chocolate Adventure. Around 13,000 objects form the museum's collection, with a further 25,000 held in an external warehouse and more than 500,000 photographs and documents in the documentation centre.

02 Why it's interesting

• 01 It is Switzerland's most-visited museum, with more than one million admissions a year across its attractions, according to the museum itself.
• 02 Its planetarium opened on 1 July 1969 — less than three weeks before Apollo 11 reached the Moon.
• 03 About 25,000 further objects wait in an external warehouse, and the documentation centre holds over 500,000 photographs and documents.
• 04 The museum is private in origin: an association of transport companies, industry and tourism bodies built it after no suitable Zurich site could be found.

03 How it works

The Verkehrshaus operates like a walkable cross-section of a country built by its transport systems, with a serious conservation and archive operation behind the display halls.

The permanent exhibition is organised by mode: Rail Transport, Road Transport, Aviation and Space Travel, Navigation, Cableways and Tourism, Energy, and Media World, plus a large outdoor area and the Hans Erni Museum devoted to the Lucerne painter and sculptor whose work is closely tied to the institution. The collection runs to roughly 13,000 objects — vehicles, aircraft, locomotives and machines — supported by the external warehouse and documentation centre that allow objects to be rotated, studied and preserved.

The planetarium is a machine for teaching the sky. Opened on 1 July 1969 with a 2.5-tonne star projector from Carl Zeiss throwing stars onto around 510 square metres of dome, it was Switzerland's first planetarium. Today it is the country's largest, with digital fulldome projection and 3D sound for shows that mix astronomy, culture and live science.

Around the core museum sit the attractions that widen the audience: a large-format film theatre, the Swiss Chocolate Adventure ride, a media world of interactive formats, and a dense programme of guided experiences for school classes. A giant aerial photograph of Switzerland at 1:20,000 scale ties the halls back to the country's geography.

Admissions, object counts, hall structure and planetarium data from the museum's official pages; founding history from standard references on the museum.

04 The organisation behind it

The museum grew from the Swiss Museum of Transport association established in 1942, in which the Swiss Federal Railways were joined by the postal, telephone and telegraph administration and by private transport, trade, industry and tourism organisations. When no Zurich site could be found, Lucerne offered a lakeside plot and the museum opened there on 1 July 1959. It remains an association under private law — today with around 40,000 members — rather than a state museum.

05 In the real world

Switzerland is, by self-definition, a country that had to invent itself through transport — Alpine tunnels, mountain railways, cable cars, airlines — and the Verkehrshaus is where that story is retold to each generation. School classes are a core audience — more than 3,000 of them, with 50,000 students, pass through each year — and the lakeside location beside its own rail stop makes it one of the country's easiest big days out. The collection also does quieter work: with around 25,000 objects in reserve and half a million documents, it functions as the national memory of Swiss mobility.

06 Can you visit?

07 Sources & further reading

1. Museum overview — Verkehrshaus der Schweizverkehrshaus.ch
2. About us — facts and figures — Verkehrshaus der Schweizverkehrshaus.ch
3. Planetarium — Verkehrshaus der Schweizverkehrshaus.ch
4. History of the planetarium — Verkehrshaus der Schweizverkehrshaus.ch
5. Swiss Museum of Transport — Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org