fall inside a hole
City Interchange (1985)
First written December 22, 2024
The City Interchange is a plastic battery-powered downhill racing game-type toy manufactured by Dah Yang Toys of Taiwan in 1985. The design of the toy is credited to Toybox on the cover. AHI Toys imported this example, and there is an AHI sticker on the corner of the box. In Japan Toybox first released the toy as City Highway (シティハイウェイ) with black roadways and a white skyscraper building and later as City Interchange (シティインターチェンジ) in colors similar to the Dah Yang version but with yellow plastic used in the lamps, signs, and helicopter as well as the inclusion of the (now pink) skyscraper. It seems like these versions may have still been manufactured in Taiwan by Dah Yang - the City Highway box states that the design is licensed to Dah Yang Toy Industrial Co. Ltd. In some ways, this toy is an advancement on the 1970s Toy Town Speed Circuit toys.
The box claims it is a realistic traffic action toy, but really all the roadway is one single loop with the three hills all on the same circuit, so there is no way to overtake or have one car fall further behind other than the cars all bunching together, which admittedly is realistic traffic.
Set contents| Quantity |
Item |
Photo |
|---|---|---|
| 4 | Cars | |
| 1 | Helicopter | |
| 1 | Lift hill |
 |
| 1 | Toll booth |
 |
| 1 | Curving track |
 |
| 1 | J track |
 |
| 1 | Loop track |
 |
| 1 |
 |
|
| 3 | Streetlights | |
| 3 | Highway signs | |
| 1 | Sign |
 |
The set includes four cars of different toolings with metal roller bearings as well as a helicopter with free-spinning blade and three highway-style signs and streetlights. These accessories are all still in the original bag in my example.
The lift hill takes one C battery and has three rubber lifting sections to raise the vehicles up and around the track. The top of the hill has a spinning section for the helicopter to be attached. The tooling is marked 1985 Dah Yang Toys as well as patent pending and made in Taiwan.
The toll booth section also has a four-slot parking lot and has part of the track going over it. All set up the track winds around itself and presents a nice raceway for the little vehicles.
The original instruction sheet. There is a massive sticker sheet included with specific stickers for each car and road sign as well as individual lane divider stripe stickers...
It is interesting to me that Toybox and Dah Yang collaborated in this way, especially with Toybox's connection to Tomy and Dah Yang having previously copied Plarail and Super Rail for their own toys... Why did Toybox license the design to Dah Yang for them to make in Taiwan and export overseas including seemingly into Japan instead of just making it themselves? Perhaps they figured they could at least get Dah Yang to be making toys that also benefitted them without having to set up their own new production lines...