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83-475: United Streetcar, LLC , was an American manufacturer of modern streetcars , located in the Clackamas area in the southeastern suburbs of Portland, Oregon , founded in 2005. It was the only U.S. company building modern streetcars—as distinct from light rail cars or new replicas of historic streetcars—until 2013, when Brookville received its first order for a modern (as opposed to faux historic) streetcar, for

166-420: A federal transportation spending bill which included a US$ 4 million grant to TriMet for the acquisition, on behalf of the city of Portland , of a prototype domestically manufactured streetcar. With a goal of fostering the domestic production of modern streetcars, the grant had been added into the $ 286 billion spending bill by Oregon Congressman Peter DeFazio , but did not specify a particular company to be

249-532: A sixth car was reinstated in 2014. These were United Streetcar model "100". Delivery began in January 2013, and the first car entered service on June 11, 2013. The City of Tucson signed a $ 26 million contract with United Streetcar on June 7, 2010, ordering seven streetcars for the Sun Link modern streetcar line that opened July 25, 2014. An eighth car was added to the order in 2012. The original announcement

332-516: A streetcar or trolley in the United States) is a type of urban rail transit consisting of either individual railcars or self-propelled multiple unit trains that run on tramway tracks on urban public streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way . The tramlines or tram networks operated as public transport are called tramways or simply trams/streetcars. Because of their close similarities, trams are commonly included in

415-622: A tram engine in the UK) at the head of a line of one or more carriages, similar to a small train. Systems with such steam trams included Christchurch , New Zealand; Sydney, Australia; other city systems in New South Wales ; Munich , Germany (from August 1883 on), British India (from 1885) and the Dublin & Blessington Steam Tramway (from 1888) in Ireland. Steam tramways also were used on

498-520: A Vermont blacksmith, had invented a battery-powered electric motor which he later patented. The following year he used it to operate a small model electric car on a short section of track four feet in diameter. Attempts to use batteries as a source of electricity were made from the 1880s and 1890s, with unsuccessful trials conducted in among other places Bendigo and Adelaide in Australia, and for about 14 years as The Hague accutram of HTM in

581-514: A decision to use different propulsion equipment in future orders, as described below. In 2010, the city of Portland decided to amend its contract with United Streetcar/Oregon Iron Works, to replace the prototype car's Škoda-made propulsion-control system with a new system to be designed by Rockwell Automation , a U.S. company based in Milwaukee , Wisconsin . The propulsion system is the high-tech electronic equipment which controls and coordinates

664-669: A desire by PS, United Streetcar and others to increase further the U.S. content of streetcars built by United Streetcar, led to discussions between Rockwell Automation and the various interested parties in Portland on the possibility and feasibility of Rockwell designing a control system for the United Streetcar design. In April 2010, the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) approved a $ 2.4-million grant, to be matched by $ 600,000 in local money, to fund

747-416: A four-axle, bi-directional , low-floor streetcar with three doors on each side and wheelchair ramps extending (on demand) from one door per side. It is 66 feet 1 inch (20.13 m) long and 8 feet 1 inch (2.46 m) wide and has a maximum speed of 44 mph (71 km/h). In 2010, the company dropped the 10T3 designation in favor of a new model designation, "100", in connection with

830-726: A similar technology, Pirotsky put into service the first public electric tramway in St. Petersburg, which operated only during September 1880. The second demonstration tramway was presented by Siemens & Halske at the 1879 Berlin Industrial Exposition. The first public electric tramway used for permanent service was the Gross-Lichterfelde tramway in Lichterfelde near Berlin in Germany, which opened in 1881. It

913-428: A streetcar to the existing Škoda 10T design but with mostly U.S. components and assembly. Only two formal proposals were received by the city, and after that of the other bidder was "deemed not to have met the minimum requirement", the contract was awarded to Oregon Iron Works, in January 2007. OIW then announced that it had created a new subsidiary, United Streetcar, LLC, to handle streetcar manufacturing. The value of

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996-946: A well-known tourist attraction . A single cable line also survives in Wellington (rebuilt in 1979 as a funicular but still called the " Wellington Cable Car "). Another system, with two separate cable lines and a shared power station in the middle, operates from the Welsh town of Llandudno up to the top of the Great Orme hill in North Wales , UK. Hastings and some other tramways, for example Stockholms Spårvägar in Sweden and some lines in Karachi , used petrol trams. Galveston Island Trolley in Texas operated diesel trams due to

1079-528: Is currently sitting in the Portland Streetcar yard unused in day-to-day operations. In spring 2009, the city of Portland announced that it had chosen United Streetcar for an order of six streetcars for a planned expansion of the Portland Streetcar system to the city's east side, and a $ 20 million contract for this order was signed in August 2009. In light of Portland's subsequent dissatisfaction with

1162-640: Is still in operation in modernised form. The earliest tram system in Canada was built by John Joseph Wright , brother of the famous mining entrepreneur Whitaker Wright , in Toronto in 1883, introducing electric trams in 1892. In the US, multiple experimental electric trams were exhibited at the 1884 World Cotton Centennial World's Fair in New Orleans, Louisiana , but they were not deemed good enough to replace

1245-734: Is the sole survivor of the fleet). In Italy, in Trieste , the Trieste–Opicina tramway was opened in 1902, with the steepest section of the route being negotiated with the help of a funicular and its cables. Cable cars suffered from high infrastructure costs, since an expensive system of cables , pulleys , stationary engines and lengthy underground vault structures beneath the rails had to be provided. They also required physical strength and skill to operate, and alert operators to avoid obstructions and other cable cars. The cable had to be disconnected ("dropped") at designated locations to allow

1328-713: The Bleecker Street Line until its closure in 1917. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania , had its Sarah Street line drawn by horses until 1923. The last regular mule-drawn cars in the US ran in Sulphur Rock, Arkansas , until 1926 and were commemorated by a U.S. postage stamp issued in 1983. The last mule tram service in Mexico City ended in 1932, and a mule tram in Celaya, Mexico , survived until 1954. The last horse-drawn tram to be withdrawn from public service in

1411-619: The Dallas Streetcar . United Streetcar was a limited liability company and was a wholly owned subsidiary of Oregon Iron Works, Inc. (OIW), which has been in business since 1944. It was originally reported to have been established in early 2007, after OIW was the successful bidder for a contract to construct a prototype streetcar for the city of Portland, but in 2010 the company clarified that it had been formed in December 2005. The company completed its first streetcar in 2009. It

1494-704: The District of Columbia Department of Transportation , in Washington, D.C., placed an order for two model 100 streetcars for use on the DC Streetcar 's H Street/Benning Road line, under construction for opening in 2015, and the order was expanded to three cars in August 2012. The three cars were delivered between January 2014 and June 2014. All three orders were completed in 2014, the last car being delivered to Portland in November of that year. The delays with

1577-933: The Lamm fireless engines then propelling the St. Charles Avenue Streetcar in that city. The first commercial installation of an electric streetcar in the United States was built in 1884 in Cleveland, Ohio , and operated for a period of one year by the East Cleveland Street Railway Company. The first city-wide electric streetcar system was implemented in 1886 in Montgomery, Alabama , by the Capital City Street Railway Company, and ran for 50 years. In 1888,

1660-584: The Oregon Secretary of State 's office acted to administratively dissolve the company, but formal dissolution did not take place until December 22, 2018. Parent Oregon Iron Works has re-purposed the U.S. facilities for boat construction, though the company has stated that they may return to rail-based equipment in the future (streetcars or otherwise). 45°25′11″N 122°33′53″W  /  45.41986°N 122.56464°W  / 45.41986; -122.56464 Streetcar A tram (also known as

1743-715: The Richmond Union Passenger Railway began to operate trams in Richmond, Virginia , that Frank J. Sprague had built. Sprague later developed multiple unit control, first demonstrated in Chicago in 1897, allowing multiple cars to be coupled together and operated by a single motorman. This gave rise to the modern subway train. Following the improvement of an overhead "trolley" system on streetcars for collecting electricity from overhead wires by Sprague, electric tram systems were rapidly adopted across

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1826-824: The West Midlands Metro in Birmingham , England adopted battery-powered trams on sections through the city centre close to Grade I listed Birmingham Town Hall . Paris and Berne (Switzerland) operated trams that were powered by compressed air using the Mekarski system . Trials on street tramways in Britain, including by the North Metropolitan Tramway Company between Kings Cross and Holloway, London (1883), achieved acceptable results but were found not to be economic because of

1909-1241: The 1850s, after which the "animal railway" became an increasingly common feature in the larger towns. The first permanent tram line in continental Europe was opened in Paris in 1855 by Alphonse Loubat who had previously worked on American streetcar lines. The tram was developed in numerous cities of Europe (some of the most extensive systems were found in Berlin, Budapest , Birmingham , Saint Petersburg , Lisbon , London , Manchester , Paris , Kyiv ). The first tram in South America opened in 1858 in Santiago, Chile . The first trams in Australia opened in 1860 in Sydney . Africa's first tram service started in Alexandria on 8 January 1863. The first trams in Asia opened in 1869 in Batavia (Jakarta), Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia) . Limitations of horsecars included

1992-713: The 1894-built horse tram at Victor Harbor in South Australia . New horse-drawn systems have been established at the Hokkaidō Museum in Japan and also in Disneyland . A horse-tram route in Polish gmina Mrozy , first built in 1902, was reopened in 2012. The first mechanical trams were powered by steam . Generally, there were two types of steam tram. The first and most common had a small steam locomotive (called

2075-420: The 1980s. The history of passenger trams, streetcars and trolley systems, began in the early nineteenth century. It can be divided into several distinct periods defined by the principal means of power used. Precursors to the tramway included the wooden or stone wagonways that were used in central Europe to transport mine carts with unflanged wheels since the 1500s, and the paved limestone trackways designed by

2158-481: The Australian state of Queensland between 1909 and 1939. Stockholm , Sweden, had a steam tram line at the island of Södermalm between 1887 and 1901. Tram engines usually had modifications to make them suitable for street running in residential areas. The wheels, and other moving parts of the machinery, were usually enclosed for safety reasons and to make the engines quieter. Measures were often taken to prevent

2241-462: The British newspaper Newcastle Daily Chronicle reported that, "A large number of London's discarded horse tramcars have been sent to Lincolnshire where they are used as sleeping rooms for potato pickers ". Horses continued to be used for light shunting well into the 20th century, and many large metropolitan lines lasted into the early 20th century. New York City had a regular horsecar service on

2324-774: The Entertainment Centre, and work is progressing on further extensions. Sydney re-introduced trams (or light rail) on 31 August 1997. A completely new system, known as G:link , was introduced on the Gold Coast, Queensland , on 20 July 2014. The Newcastle Light Rail opened in February 2019, while the Canberra light rail opened on 20 April 2019. This is the first time that there have been trams in Canberra, even though Walter Burley Griffin 's 1914–1920 plans for

2407-583: The Irish coach builder John Stephenson , in New York City which began service in the year 1832. The New York and Harlem Railroad's Fourth Avenue Line ran along the Bowery and Fourth Avenue in New York City. It was followed in 1835 by the New Orleans and Carrollton Railroad in New Orleans, Louisiana , which still operates as the St. Charles Streetcar Line . Other American cities did not follow until

2490-545: The Netherlands. The first trams in Bendigo, Australia, in 1892, were battery-powered, but within as little as three months they were replaced with horse-drawn trams. In New York City some minor lines also used storage batteries. Then, more recently during the 1950s, a longer battery-operated tramway line ran from Milan to Bergamo . In China there is a Nanjing battery Tram line and has been running since 2014. In 2019,

2573-789: The North Sydney line from 1886 to 1900, and the King Street line from 1892 to 1905. In Dresden , Germany, in 1901 an elevated suspended cable car following the Eugen Langen one-railed floating tram system started operating. Cable cars operated on Highgate Hill in North London and Kennington to Brixton Hill in South London. They also worked around "Upper Douglas" in the Isle of Man from 1897 to 1929 (cable car 72/73

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2656-586: The Portland Streetcar fleet, it was the first modern streetcar built in the United States since 1952, since the last PCC streetcar for the San Francisco Municipal Railway . It uses the Škoda 10T design, under license from the Czech manufacturer, and is model variant 10T3. The propulsion equipment—the motors and electronic control system—were fabricated by Škoda, but installation took place at OIW's/United Streetcar's plant in

2739-747: The Romans for heavy horse and ox-drawn transportation. By the 1700s, paved plateways with cast iron rails were introduced in England for transporting coal, stone or iron ore from the mines to the urban factories and docks. The world's first passenger train or tram was the Swansea and Mumbles Railway , in Wales , UK. The British Parliament passed the Mumbles Railway Act in 1804, and horse-drawn service started in 1807. The service closed in 1827, but

2822-577: The Second Street Cable Railroad, which operated from 1885 to 1889, and the Temple Street Cable Railway, which operated from 1886 to 1898. From 1885 to 1940, the city of Melbourne , Victoria, Australia operated one of the largest cable systems in the world, at its peak running 592 trams on 75 kilometres (47 mi) of track. There were also two isolated cable lines in Sydney , New South Wales, Australia;

2905-887: The UK at Lytham St Annes , Trafford Park , Manchester (1897–1908) and Neath , Wales (1896–1920). Comparatively little has been published about gas trams. However, research on the subject was carried out for an article in the October 2011 edition of "The Times", the historical journal of the Australian Association of Timetable Collectors, later renamed the Australian Timetable Association. The world's first electric tram line operated in Sestroretsk near Saint Petersburg invented and tested by inventor Fyodor Pirotsky in 1875. Later, using

2988-410: The UK took passengers from Fintona railway station to Fintona Junction one mile away on the main Omagh to Enniskillen railway in Northern Ireland. The tram made its last journey on 30 September 1957 when the Omagh to Enniskillen line closed. The "van" is preserved at the Ulster Transport Museum . Horse-drawn trams still operate on the 1876-built Douglas Bay Horse Tramway on the Isle of Man , and at

3071-430: The United States Code The title was enacted into positive law by Pub. L.   95–473 , § 1, October 17, 1978, 92  Stat.   1337 ; Pub. L.   97–449 , § 1, January 12, 1983, 96  Stat.   2413 ; and Pub. L.   103–272 , July 5, 1994, 108  Stat.   745 (subtitles II, III, and V-X) During the time between when the Title 49 positive law codification began in 1978 and when it

3154-401: The United States, and most other components were fabricated by United Streetcar or supplied by other U.S. companies. Overall, the prototype streetcar has about 70 percent U.S. content, enough to make the car's procurement compliant with federal "Buy America" provisions ( 49 U.S.C.   § 5323j ). As with the earlier, Czech-built versions of the Škoda 10T, the United Streetcar 10T3 is

3237-508: The advantages over earlier forms of transit was the low rolling resistance of metal wheels on steel rails, allowing the trams to haul a greater load for a given effort. Another factor which contributed to the rise of trams was the high total cost of ownership of horses. Electric trams largely replaced animal power in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Improvements in other vehicles such as buses led to decline of trams in early to mid 20th century. However, trams have seen resurgence since

3320-460: The busiest tram line in Europe, with a tram running once per minute at rush hour. Bucharest and Belgrade ran a regular service from 1894. Ljubljana introduced its tram system in 1901 – it closed in 1958. Oslo had the first tramway in Scandinavia , starting operation on 2 March 1894. The first electric tramway in Australia was a Sprague system demonstrated at the 1888 Melbourne Centennial Exhibition in Melbourne ; afterwards, this

3403-439: The capital then in the planning stage did propose a Canberra tram system. In Japan, the Kyoto Electric railroad was the first tram system, starting operation in 1895. By 1932, the network had grown to 82 railway companies in 65 cities, with a total network length of 1,479 km (919 mi). By the 1960s the tram had generally died out in Japan. Two rare but significant alternatives were conduit current collection , which

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3486-410: The car deliveries, as well as teething issues experienced with the cars in service created tensions with the company's clients. In 2011, the company was working on a model 300 design that would have included the capability to operate away from the overhead wires, but it never reached production, and competitor Brookville Equipment Corporation completed such a design by 2013. As a relative newcomer to

3569-458: The car up the hill at a steady pace, unlike a low-powered steam or horse-drawn car. Cable cars do have wheel brakes and track brakes , but the cable also helps restrain the car to going downhill at a constant speed. Performance in steep terrain partially explains the survival of cable cars in San Francisco. The San Francisco cable cars , though significantly reduced in number, continue to provide regular transportation service, in addition to being

3652-402: The cars to coast by inertia, for example when crossing another cable line. The cable then had to be "picked up" to resume progress, the whole operation requiring precise timing to avoid damage to the cable and the grip mechanism. Breaks and frays in the cable, which occurred frequently, required the complete cessation of services over a cable route while the cable was repaired. Due to overall wear,

3735-409: The city's hurricane-prone location, which would have resulted in frequent damage to an electrical supply system. Although Portland, Victoria promotes its tourist tram as being a cable car it actually operates using a diesel motor. The tram, which runs on a circular route around the town of Portland, uses dummies and salons formerly used on the Melbourne cable tramway system and since restored. In

3818-419: The classic tramway built in the early 20th century with the tram system operating in mixed traffic, and the later type which is most often associated with the tram system having its own right of way. Tram systems that have their own right of way are often called light rail but this does not always hold true. Though these two systems differ in their operation, their equipment is much the same. Title 49 of

3901-416: The combined coal consumption of the stationary compressor and the onboard steam boiler. The Trieste–Opicina tramway in Trieste operates a hybrid funicular tramway system. Conventional electric trams are operated in street running and on reserved track for most of their route. However, on one steep segment of track, they are assisted by cable tractors, which push the trams uphill and act as brakes for

3984-481: The contract was $ 3.2 million, with the balance of the special $ 4 million federal grant being used to fund the city's costs to administer the grant and oversee the project. Construction of the prototype streetcar was undertaken at OIW's Clackamas facility (one of two OIW manufacturing facilities). The car was completed in June 2009 and was introduced to the public and the media at a ceremony held in Portland's South Waterfront district on July 1, 2009. Numbered 015 in

4067-430: The downhill run. For safety, the cable tractors are always deployed on the downhill side of the tram vehicle. Similar systems were used elsewhere in the past, notably on the Queen Anne Counterbalance in Seattle and the Darling Street wharf line in Sydney. In the mid-20th century many tram systems were disbanded, replaced by buses, trolleybuses , automobiles or rapid transit . The General Motors streetcar conspiracy

4150-446: The engines from emitting visible smoke or steam. Usually the engines used coke rather than coal as fuel to avoid emitting smoke; condensers or superheating were used to avoid emitting visible steam. A major drawback of this style of tram was the limited space for the engine, so that these trams were usually underpowered. Steam trams faded out around the 1890s to 1900s, being replaced by electric trams. Another motive system for trams

4233-429: The entire length of cable (typically several kilometres) had to be replaced on a regular schedule. After the development of reliable electrically powered trams, the costly high-maintenance cable car systems were rapidly replaced in most locations. Cable cars remained especially effective in hilly cities, since their nondriven wheels did not lose traction as they climbed or descended a steep hill. The moving cable pulled

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4316-439: The fact that any given animal could only work so many hours on a given day, had to be housed, groomed, fed and cared for day in and day out, and produced prodigious amounts of manure, which the streetcar company was charged with storing and then disposing. Since a typical horse pulled a streetcar for about a dozen miles a day and worked for four or five hours, many systems needed ten or more horses in stable for each horsecar. In 1905

4399-444: The late 19th and early 20th centuries a number of systems in various parts of the world employed trams powered by gas, naphtha gas or coal gas in particular. Gas trams are known to have operated between Alphington and Clifton Hill in the northern suburbs of Melbourne , Australia (1886–1888); in Berlin and Dresden , Germany; in Estonia (1921–1951); between Jelenia Góra , Cieplice , and Sobieszów in Poland (from 1897); and in

4482-402: The late 19th and early 20th centuries. There was one particular hazard associated with trams powered from a trolley pole off an overhead line on the early electrified systems. Since the tram relies on contact with the rails for the current return path, a problem arises if the tram is derailed or (more usually) if it halts on a section of track that has been heavily sanded by a previous tram, and

4565-480: The market, with a single design offering, United Streetcar found it difficult to compete with more well-established builders such as Siemens and Bombardier . Consequently, the company received no further orders, and ceased production after the final car was delivered, mothballing its facilities in December 2014. United Streetcar president Kevin Clarke left the company that same month. In February 2015, after United Streetcar had declined to produce an annual report,

4648-475: The necessity of overhead wire and a trolley pole for street cars and railways. While at the University of Denver he conducted experiments which established that multiple unit powered cars were a better way to operate trains and trolleys. Electric tramways spread to many European cities in the 1890s, such as: Sarajevo built a citywide system of electric trams in 1895. Budapest established its tramway system in 1887, and its ring line has grown to be

4731-421: The oldest operating electric tramway in the world. Also in 1883, Mödling and Hinterbrühl Tram was opened near Vienna in Austria. It was the first tram in the world in regular service that was run with electricity served by an overhead line with pantograph current collectors . The Blackpool Tramway was opened in Blackpool, UK on 29 September 1885 using conduit collection along Blackpool Promenade. This system

4814-546: The operation of the car's motors and other key operating components. Car 015's propulsion-control system was made by Škoda, whereas all 10 earlier Portland streetcars—even the seven cars built by Škoda—had control systems supplied by ELIN EBG Traction , an Austrian company (and only installed by Škoda). During acceptance testing of car 015 in late summer and autumn 2009, certain (unspecified) problems were encountered, and Škoda and Portland Streetcar were unable to reach agreement on resolving them. This issue, together with

4897-415: The poor paving of the streets in American cities which made them unsuitable for horsebuses , which were then common on the well-paved streets of European cities. Running the horsecars on rails allowed for a much smoother ride. There are records of a street railway running in Baltimore as early as 1828, however the first authenticated streetcar in America, was the New York and Harlem Railroad developed by

4980-407: The recipient. In August 2006, the city of Portland issued a Request for Proposals for the provision of a prototype low-floor streetcar compatible with Portland Streetcar's existing fleet. In anticipation of this, OIW signed a "technology transfer agreement" in February 2006 with Škoda , the Czech company which had built Portland's first seven streetcars, in order to permit OIW to manufacture

5063-406: The replacement of car 015's control equipment with new equipment to be designed by Rockwell Automation. The intention was that, if the partnership with Rockwell proved successful, eventually all streetcars built by United Streetcar would use the U.S.-made Rockwell propulsion system. It was stated that the change would increase the overall U.S. content of the car from around 70% to around 90%, and this

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5146-419: The suburban tramway lines around Milan and Padua ; the last Gamba de Legn ("Peg-Leg") tramway ran on the Milan- Magenta -Castano Primo route in late 1957. The other style of steam tram had the steam engine in the body of the tram, referred to as a tram engine (UK) or steam dummy (US). The most notable system to adopt such trams was in Paris. French-designed steam trams also operated in Rockhampton , in

5229-436: The tracks. Siemens later designed his own version of overhead current collection, called the bow collector . One of the first systems to use it was in Thorold, Ontario , opened in 1887, and it was considered quite successful. While this line proved quite versatile as one of the earliest fully functional electric streetcar installations, it required horse-drawn support while climbing the Niagara Escarpment and for two months of

5312-416: The tram and completing the earth return circuit with their body could receive a serious electric shock. If "grounded", the driver was required to jump off the tram (avoiding simultaneous contact with the tram and the ground) and pull down the trolley pole, before allowing passengers off the tram. Unless derailed, the tram could usually be recovered by running water down the running rails from a point higher than

5395-407: The tram loses electrical contact with the rails. In this event, the underframe of the tram, by virtue of a circuit path through ancillary loads (such as interior lighting), is live at the full supply voltage, typically 600 volts DC. In British terminology, such a tram was said to be 'grounded'—not to be confused with the US English use of the term, which means the exact opposite. Any person stepping off

5478-427: The tram, the water providing a conducting bridge between the tram and the rails. With improved technology, this ceased to be an problem. In the 2000s, several companies introduced catenary-free designs: Alstom's Citadis line uses a third rail, Bombardier's PRIMOVE LRV is charged by contactless induction plates embedded in the trackway and CAF URBOS tram uses ultracaps technology As early as 1834, Thomas Davenport ,

5561-804: The wider term light rail , which also includes systems separated from other traffic. Tram vehicles are usually lighter and shorter than main line and rapid transit trains. Most trams use electrical power, usually fed by a pantograph sliding on an overhead line ; older systems may use a trolley pole or a bow collector . In some cases, a contact shoe on a third rail is used. If necessary, they may have dual power systems—electricity in city streets and diesel in more rural environments. Occasionally, trams also carry freight . Some trams, known as tram-trains , may have segments that run on mainline railway tracks, similar to interurban systems. The differences between these modes of rail transport are often indistinct, and systems may combine multiple features. One of

5644-409: The winter when hydroelectricity was not available. It continued in service in its original form into the 1950s. Sidney Howe Short designed and produced the first electric motor that operated a streetcar without gears. The motor had its armature direct-connected to the streetcar 's axle for the driving force. Short pioneered "use of a conduit system of concealed feed" thereby eliminating

5727-429: The world's first hydrogen fuel cell vehicle tramcar at an assembly facility in Qingdao . The chief engineer of the CSR subsidiary CSR Sifang Co Ltd. , Liang Jianying, said that the company is studying how to reduce the running costs of the tram. Trams have been used for two main purposes: for carrying passengers and for carrying cargo. There are several types of passenger tram: There are two main types of tramways,

5810-401: The world. Earlier electric trains proved difficult or unreliable and experienced limited success until the second half of the 1880s, when new types of current collectors were developed. Siemens' line, for example, provided power through a live rail and a return rail, like a model train , limiting the voltage that could be used, and delivering electric shocks to people and animals crossing

5893-414: The Škoda propulsion system, the city decided in 2010 to modify the OIW/United Streetcar contract for these six cars, to substitute equipment from Elin EBG Traction for the originally planned Škoda equipment, which delayed their completion. The cars would receive motors supplied by Siemens , which has a U.S. factory, instead of by Škoda. In mid-2011, the order was reduced from six cars to five; purchase of

5976-682: Was a case study of the decline of trams in the United States. In the 21st century, trams have been re-introduced in cities where they had been closed down for decades (such as Tramlink in London), or kept in heritage use (such as Spårväg City in Stockholm). Most trams made since the 1990s (such as the Bombardier Flexity series and Alstom Citadis ) are articulated low-floor trams with features such as regenerative braking . In March 2015, China South Rail Corporation (CSR) demonstrated

6059-491: Was built by Werner von Siemens who contacted Pirotsky. This was the world's first commercially successful electric tram. It drew current from the rails at first, with overhead wire being installed in 1883. In Britain, Volk's Electric Railway was opened in 1883 in Brighton. This two kilometer line along the seafront, re-gauged to 2 ft  8 + 1 ⁄ 2  in ( 825 mm ) in 1884, remains in service as

6142-540: Was completed in 1994, the remaining non-positive law sections were placed in an appendix to Title 49. In 1995, the ICC Termination Act , substantively and significantly amended Title 49. In 2010, Congress enacted Title 51 as a new positive law title concerning NASA and commercial space programs. As part of the codification, the heading of Subtitle IX was marked "transferred" and the contents of such subtitle were moved to Title 51. Five years later,

6225-492: Was dissolved in February 2015. Oregon Iron Works, a specialized manufacturer of complex structural components and systems, began considering entering the field of streetcar manufacturing in 2004, after realizing that the Portland Streetcar system had purchased vehicles built only by foreign manufacturers, possibly due to the absence of any U.S.-based manufacturers of modern streetcars. In 2005, Congress approved

6308-487: Was installed as a commercial venture operating between the outer Melbourne suburb of Box Hill and the then tourist-oriented country town Doncaster from 1889 to 1896. Electric systems were also built in Adelaide , Ballarat , Bendigo , Brisbane , Fremantle , Geelong , Hobart , Kalgoorlie , Launceston , Leonora , Newcastle , Perth , and Sydney . By the 1970s, the only full tramway system remaining in Australia

6391-660: Was made in May 2009, but the Tucson project was still awaiting FTA approval at that time. FTA approved the plans in late September 2009 and (jointly with the United States Department of Transportation ) granted $ 69 million in early 2010 to help complete the project. The Tucson cars are model variant 200, the main difference from model 100 being a more powerful air-conditioning system. The first streetcar for Sun Link arrived in Tucson on August 30, 2013. In April 2012,

6474-621: Was restarted in 1860, again using horses. It was worked by steam from 1877, and then, from 1929, by very large (106-seat) electric tramcars, until closure in 1960. The Swansea and Mumbles Railway was something of a one-off however, and no street tramway appeared in Britain until 1860 when one was built in Birkenhead by the American George Francis Train . Street railways developed in America before Europe, due to

6557-628: Was tested in San Francisco , in 1873. Part of its success is attributed to the development of an effective and reliable cable grip mechanism, to grab and release the moving cable without damage. The second city to operate cable trams was Dunedin , from 1881 to 1957. The most extensive cable system in the US was built in Chicago in stages between 1859 and 1892. New York City developed multiple cable car lines, that operated from 1883 to 1909. Los Angeles also had several cable car lines, including

6640-635: Was the Melbourne tram system. However, there were also a few single lines remaining elsewhere: the Glenelg tram line , connecting Adelaide to the beachside suburb of Glenelg , and tourist trams in the Victorian Goldfields cities of Bendigo and Ballarat. In recent years the Melbourne system, generally recognised as the largest urban tram network in the world, has been considerably modernised and expanded. The Adelaide line has been extended to

6723-411: Was the cable car, which was pulled along a fixed track by a moving steel cable, the cable usually running in a slot below the street level. The power to move the cable was normally provided at a "powerhouse" site a distance away from the actual vehicle. The London and Blackwall Railway , which opened for passengers in east London, England, in 1840 used such a system. The first practical cable car line

6806-668: Was the main factor in gaining federal officials' approval of the $ 2.4 million in "research funds" needed to allow project to proceed. Prototype streetcar 015 was transported back to the OIW/United Streetcar factory in May 2010, to await design and then installation of the Rockwell system. With the installation completed in late 2011, it returned to the Portland Streetcar carhouse on April 30, 2012, to begin acceptance testing. It entered service on September 22, 2012; however, since 2012, issues have still plagued car 015 and it

6889-830: Was widely used in London, Washington, D.C., and New York City, and the surface contact collection method, used in Wolverhampton (the Lorain system), Torquay and Hastings in the UK (the Dolter stud system), and in Bordeaux , France (the ground-level power supply system). The convenience and economy of electricity resulted in its rapid adoption once the technical problems of production and transmission of electricity were solved. Electric trams largely replaced animal power and other forms of motive power including cable and steam, in

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