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The Memphis Street Railway Company was a privately owned operator of streetcars (trams) and trolleybuses in Memphis, Tennessee on roughly 160 route miles of overhead electrified cable and rails between 1895 and 1960. The longest of the rail lines reached from downtown to Memphis National Cemetery near Raleigh. [1]
The Memphis Street Railway was created in March 1895 through the merger of several smaller systems including the Memphis & Raleigh Springs Railroad, East End Street Railway, Citizens Street Railroad and City & Suburban Railway. In 1890, when The Citizens Street Railroad of Memphis, Tenn., suffered a financial setback, Mr. Albert Merritt Billings of Chicago, bought the company for over $2,000,000. Billings placed electric power on the roads and the company became a great success. [2] Billings recruited Mr. Frank G. Jones from Iowa to operate the company as vice-president. [3] At its peak the interurban operated nearly 77 miles of trackage, 51 one of which was double-track. Service lasted until the 1940s when operations were abandoned in favor of buses.
Memphis, then only 44 square miles (smaller than San Francisco), could be traversed easily with frequent service to within blocks of any corner in the city. Fares included a free transfer.
1 Normal
2 Fair Grounds
3 Raleigh-Macon Road
6 Lamar [trolleybus]
7 Crosstown
8 Elmwood
9 Glenview
11 Wellington
12 Florida
14 Second-Desoto Park
15 Jackson
16 Lane-Faxon
17 Forest-Hill
19 Walker Av
Streetcars remained in use until 1947 when electric trolleybuses (trackless trolleys) were phased in fully. Trolleybuses were discontinued in use for diesel buses by 1960. In 1961, The City of Memphis Transit Authority, the agency that would later become MATA in 1975, took over and became publicly owned.
African Americans successfully sued the Memphis Street Railway Company for personal injury and racial insult. African American working-class men and women were often financially compensated for physical injuries, while African American middle-class women won their lawsuits against white conductors who insulted their personal dignity.
The formerly major intersection at Main St and Madison Ave of the Main St and Fair Grounds lines are returned to service by the now-public descendant agency’s Main Street and Madison Avenue Trolleys.
The Hamilton Street Railway (HSR) is the public transport agency for Hamilton, Ontario. The name is a legacy of the company's early period, when public transit in Hamilton was primarily served by streetcars. Although streetcars are no longer used in the city today, the HSR operates bus and paratransit services, with a ridership of 21 million passengers a year.
The St. Louis Car Company was a major United States manufacturer of railroad passenger cars, streetcars, interurbans, trolleybuses and locomotives that existed from 1887 to 1974, based in St. Louis, Missouri.
Seashore Trolley Museum, located in Kennebunkport, Maine, United States, is the world's first and largest museum of mass transit vehicles. While the main focus of the collection is trolley cars (trams), it also includes rapid transit trains, Interurban cars, trolley buses, and motor buses. The Seashore Trolley Museum is owned and operated by the New England Electric Railway Historical Society (NEERHS). Of the museum's collection of more than 350 vehicles, ten trolley and railroad cars that historically operated in Maine were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980 as Maine Trolley Cars.
As with many large cities, a large number of Boston-area streetcar lines once existed, and many continued operating into the 1950s. However, only a few now remain, namely the four branches of the Green Line and the Ashmont–Mattapan High-Speed Line, with only one running regular service on an undivided street.
The Illinois Railway Museum is the largest railroad museum in the United States. It is located in the Chicago metropolitan area at 7000 Olson Road in Union, Illinois, 55 miles (89 km) northwest of downtown Chicago.
Streetcars in Washington, D.C. transported people across the city and region from 1862 until 1962.
The Denver Tramway, operating in Denver, Colorado, was a streetcar system incorporated in 1886. The tramway was unusual for a number of reasons: the term "tramway" is generally not used in the United States, and it is not known why the company was named as such. The track was 3 ft 6 in narrow gauge, an unusual gauge in the United States, but in general use by railways in Japan, southern Africa, New Zealand, and Queensland, Australia.
Timeline of mass transit in Atlanta:
The Chicago Surface Lines (CSL) was operator of the street railway system of Chicago, Illinois, from 1913 to 1947. The firm is a predecessor of today's publicly owned operator, the Chicago Transit Authority.
The Shore Line Trolley Museum is a trolley museum located in East Haven, Connecticut. Incorporated in 1945, it is the oldest continuously operating trolley museum in the United States. The museum includes exhibits on trolley history in the visitors' center and offers rides on restored trolleys along its 1.5 mi (2.4 km) track as the Branford Electric Railway. In addition to trolleys, the museum also operates restored subway cars, a small number of both trolleybuses and conventional buses.
The Phoenix Street Railway provided streetcar service in Phoenix, Arizona, United States, from 1888 to 1948. The motto was "Ride a Mile and Smile the While."
Streetcars and interurbans operated in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C., between 1890 and 1962.
The Washington Railway and Electric Company (WRECo) was the larger of the two major streetcar companies in Washington, D.C., and its Maryland suburbs in the early decades of the 20th century.
The MATA Trolley is a heritage streetcar transit system operating in Memphis, Tennessee. It began operating on April 29, 1993. Service was suspended in June 2014, following fires on two cars. After nearly four years and repeated postponements, the reopening of the Main Street Line took place on April 30, 2018. The system's two other lines remained suspended as of December 2022, but with reopening of both planned. In 2023, the system had a ridership of 365,400.
The Oregon Electric Railway Museum is the largest streetcar/trolley museum in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. It is owned and operated by the Oregon Electric Railway Historical Society and is located in Brooks, Oregon, on the grounds of Powerland Heritage Park.
Streetcars in St. Louis, Missouri, operated as part of the transportation network of St. Louis from the middle of the 19th century through the early 1960s.
Streetcars originally operated in Atlanta downtown and into the surrounding areas from 1871 until the final line's closure in 1949.
The United Electric Railways Company (UER) was the Providence-based operator of the system of interurban streetcars, trolleybuses, and trolley freight in the state of Rhode Island in the early- to mid-twentieth century.
Public transit has taken numerous forms in Columbus, the largest city and capital of Ohio. Transit has variously used passenger trains, horsecars, streetcars, interurbans, trolley coaches, and buses. Current service is through the Central Ohio Transit Authority's bus system, numerous intercity bus companies, and through bikeshare, rideshare, and electric scooter services.
Homans, James E., ed. (1918). . The Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: The Press Association Compilers, Inc.