Tram, Trollies and Traction

[Mudkip Orange]

In my experience the Streetcar/Trolley distinction is a northern/southern thing. In the east the dividing line seems to be Baltimore/DC (DC is Streetcar, Baltimore is Trolley). In the west it's blurrier.

[KenS]

This poll needs an "all of the above".

 

I use "Trolley" when talking about historic light rail (I live in the U.S. Northeast), or "Light Rail" for modern stuff.  Except on this board, where I mainly use "tram" because that word is more commonly used in international English and by the members of the board. I'll admit I've never used "Traction" or "電気軌道" to date, but perhaps the right situation just hasn't come up.

 

And I think Mudkip's right about the regional use of Trolley/Streetcar, as while I've often read "streetcar", I've never heard the term used in person. However, I have read of "horse-drawn streetcars" on rails that predated the trolley, in books about northeastern cities in the nineteenth century, so maybe it was a more widely-used term that just fell out of use up here, but remained in use further south.

 

If you want to get technical, "Trolley" isn't really correct except for light rail with electrical pickup via a single (or double for two-wire systems) pole with a grooved wheel on the end. But it's often used generically, at least in parts of the U.S.

 

I've never believed there was one "right" way to say anything.  Particularly in English, where there are multiple words for any concept often with shadings of meanings, part of the fun is picking the right word for the audience and exact meaning you want to convey, while understanding that someone else won't always pick the same word for the same thing. So while I clicked "trolley", I vote "all of the above". 

[Strassenbahnfan]

Talk about "muddy water" , I am originally from Pennsylvania where I have called them trolleys for years, but I model mostly european(Germany) so I use strassenbahn (streetcar), but with the explosion of model tram track(Tomy Tec and Kato) lately I am catching myself calling them trams. Since I model mostly the German version, I voted Streetcar.Like I said "muddy water". :)

[Eisenbahn]

It's Ok to Name it Streetcar if you so Desire. :)

 

Perhaps "Multi-Car-People-Moving-Vehicle-On-Rails-through-Streets" might be an alternative and more precise. It would sound better in German as a compound noun though....even if harder to pronounce.

 

Generally I prefer words like car bus train tram.

 

Although having 'bahn' in a word is always a plus :) ........cheers....Eisenbahn

[bill937ca]

I too grew up with streetcar, but now prefer tram.  My next layout will be European trams.

[KenS]

In New England, the "bahn" is where we keep the cows. :)

 

and I still want an "all of the above" vote.

[Eisenbahn]

Hi KenS,

 

Thanks for taking the Bahn/barn catch. I hoped someone would pickup on it.  Perhaps my earlier play on words about Tennessee Williams play Streetcar named Desire was a bit cryptic or not worth it.  never mind.  Australian English doesnt use Streetcar and it was the play/film ,Streetcar Named Desire,where I first heard the name Streetcar. Until the 1960s the East Cost capital cities here had trams but only Melbourne kept them. Sydney has recently reintroduced Trams but calls them Light Rail. They operate on streets and also their own light rail corridors. Brisbane had trams and trolley busses but they have long since gone.

 

Here is a photo from Karlsruhe Germany of what looks like a tram at the main station but which uses regular rail tracks.

 

This is a photo of driverless light rail( 4 car set) in Kuala Lumpur but which looks like a train. (At Central Station)

 

The light rail in Sydney Australia looks like Trams.

 

The test I use is if they run on the road with cars and people they are trams and if they run on rail corridors and use rail stations they are trains.  Although I found it a bit hard to call the one I saw at Karlsruhe a Train.

It is best just to call them whatever the locals call them when you are talking with them and thus 'All of the Above' would be a response I would choose.

 

cheers.......Ice&barn

 

Edited March 1, 2013 by Eisenbahn

[Eisenbahn]

 

Edited March 1, 2013 by Eisenbahn

[KenS]

All the new ones here are called "light rail" too.  At least all the ones I'm familiar with. Language has gotten too generic.

 

I think the distinction between "train" and "tram" is more than just right-of-way type. And I know they now have "tram-train" systems in some places in Europe, where the same vehicle operates somewhat differently on both kinds of right of way, which just complicates things more.

 

To me, a tram/trolley/LRV is differentiated from a train by a number of factors, but it's not necessarily an either/or kind of thing, as there are some that don't have all the characteristics, but are clearly one or the other (Tokyo's Setagaya line uses full-on stations and mostly a private right of way, but is otherwise clearly an LRV) and others that are just plain ambiguous (e.g. single-car diesel rail cars act much like trains, but share many of the chracteristics of LRVs).

 

Some things I think make a vehicle/system a tram/trolley/LRV:

- Lighter-weight rail

- powered by low-voltage electric catenary

- frequent stops with at most a small platform

- payment on vehicle, not at station

- short vehicle length (1-3 cars typical)

- lighter-weight vehicle construction

- urban or urban-to-suburban operation

- street or median running (at least partially)

- low-speed operation

 

But you can find exceptions to every one of those, and few systems/vehicles will match all the criteria.

 

Back on language, one interesting thing I've noticed is that the place where trolleys (or whatever) are stored is often called a "trolley barn" or "car barn", while the place when locomotives are stored is called an "engine house" or "roundhouse".  Clearly, trolleys are indeed like cows and aren't let inside. :)

 

Just to wreck my nice linguistic structure, the Brits use a "shed" to store locomotives, so I guess theirs don't rate being kept in the house.

[lurkingknight]

to pick at an old topic, I sort of view a streetcar as a 1 car vehicle, and at most 1 articulation to join 2 cars, or a hitch to join 2 cars... beyond that I start calling it light rail or tram.. In toronto they call it streetcar, and even the new multi articulated vehicles now will probably still be called streetcar, even though some of those lines are dedicated in street but are closed to road traffic.

Edited May 30, 2013 by lurkingknight

[KenS]

That's a good point.  I think I've only heard "streetcar" used for a single-box vehicle, and the singular "car" tends to imply that as well. While "light rail" vehicles tend to be modern multi-box articulated vehicles.

[Guest ___]

Tram looks like the winner

[westfalen]

I'm a late voter but I've added my voice to tram.

[kvp]

Tram is the most generic term.

 

In hungarian, the following is used:

-for trams: villamos (long form: villamosvasut) literally: electric train, so this is the same as the japanese term

-for trolleybuses: troli (long form trolibusz), because only the rubber wheeled electric buses use trolley poles

 

The rail weight distinction doesn't really exist, since the tram standard is the old prussian freight interchange standard which is somewhat narrower and shorter than the current european freight profile, but allows most of the normal equipment to move on tram tracks, so they could be shared. Just two decades ago, it was completly normal to see freight trains moving amongst the trams and there are recent examples where some suburban lines are shared by local and intercity trains. The fact that all tram and heavy rail platforms are low level also helps. Not to mention lots of tram routes are actually interurban, so a 3 car tram is completly normal. The best example for blurred light/heavy rail/tram usage is the tram route 4-6, which is 100% street running and also contains in the middle the first hungarian tram route made 127 years ago. This line is served by 6 car articulated combino supra trams and connected 3 car ganz articulated trams and in the past 6 car uv trams, with one tram arriving every minute during rush hours, so it provides the capacity of a heavy metro system, without having a fully separated right of way. Many smaller tram routes (served by 1 or 2 car trams) were switched to trolleybus routes a few decades ago, where the biggest vehicles are also articulated, like most of the internal combustion buses. Beside these we have the suburban lines, that equal to the standard japanese commuter lines with trains of 6 cars as a norm and the various metro lines, from the 118 years old 'little underground' line (the world's first electric underground, with 100% low floor cars and one man ATS operation from the start and after all these years still using the old stations in their original 19th century form) to the more modern heavy metro lines. The interesting thing is that all of these lines are interconnected with each other and also with most heavy rail lines, so you can never really know what piece of rolling stock pops up where.

[Mr Frosty]

In the UK, "Trolley" referred to Trolley-Buses,  electric road buses taking their power from overhead lines.

 

 

Most of these dissappeared in the 60's

[Martijn Meerts]

Meh, those overhead lines don't provide power, they're there to make sure the things don't tip over when there's more than a breeze ;)

[KenS]

Cambridge, Mass (next to Boston) still has trolley-buses, although if wikipedia is to be believed they call them trackless trolleys. I heard trolleybus when I was younger, but I've never lived near the city. These are on former trolley routes, or "streetcar" per wikipedia so perhaps we did still use the term.

 

The new Silver Line "Bus rapid Transit" line in Boston uses "dual-mode busses", which use trolley poles in a tunnel and diesel elsewhere, but these aren't called trolleybuses (or trackless trolleys), apparently because they're not just electric but also diesel.

 

Both systems are operated by the same transit authority (which also runs normal buses, heavy-rail subway, light-rail subway, and commuter trains, plus ferrys, water taxis and probably other things). You'd think they could use one name for buses with trolley poles.