The Nelson Electric Tramway is a heritage railway at Nelson in the Kootenay region of southeastern British Columbia. It is one of two operational historic tram systems in the province.
Nelson Electric Tramway | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Overview | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Locale | Nelson, British Columbia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Transit type | Heritage streetcar, seasonal | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Number of lines | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Number of stations | 4 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Website | https://www.nelsonstreetcar.org/ | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Operation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Began operation | June 1992 [1] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Operator(s) | Nelson Electric Tramway Society | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Number of vehicles | 2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Headway | 30 Minutes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Technical | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
System length | 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
No. of tracks | 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Track gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Old gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Electrification | 600 V DC, overhead wires | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
1899: Nelson Electric Tramway Co. Ltd. inaugurated service along Front St. on December 21. [2] Opening of the hill section was postponed after Car 2 derailed causing serious injuries. [3]
1900: Hill section opened on April 8. [4]
1905: City contracted to operate the system for four years, because the company had incurred losses every year. [5]
1908: A fire in the substation on April 25 caused extensive damage. A fire in the car barn on April 27 destroyed the building and two streetcars. Service was suspended. [6]
1910: Newly formed Nelson Street Railway Co. reopened the system on November 8. [7]
1914: City purchased the system on February 1, because the company had incurred ongoing losses. [8]
1949: Final run when diesel buses replaced rails on June 20. [9]
1980: Private owner wished to dispose of Car 23 and the bridge from the Nasookin . The city considered acquiring the former for restoration as a bus stop shelter. [9]
1982: Chamber of commerce acquired and moved Car 23 to an indoor facility at Selkirk College. The chamber and college obtained a federal grant to begin restoration. [10]
1984: Second federal grant for $26,000 received. [11]
1985: Project shifted from producing a static exhibit to an operational car. [12]
1987: Third federal grant for $104,000 received. [13]
1988: Car 23 moved into a temporary car barn on the southeast corner of Hall and Front streets. [13] The Nelson Electric Tramway Society incorporated. The chamber gave the society title to the facility, and various tramway artifacts. [14]
1989: Provincial grant for $430,000 received. [15] Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) donated rails salvaged from the Rosebery–Nakusp line abandonment. [16]
1990: CP employee volunteers began laying track. [16] Permanent car barn built and Car 23 moved in. [17] Car 400 arrived. [18]
1991: Chamber transferred ownership of Car 23 to the society. [14] Track laying completed. [18]
1992: Overhead wiring and substation completed. [19] On June 15, passenger service began. On July 1, the official opening was held. [1] [20]
2011: Annual ridership set a record of over 15,000. [21] Restoration work on Car 400 was completed. Car 400 operated for the first time since 1948.
2012: Spring flooding along the lakeshore caused $15,000 in damages to the streetcar tracks and the storage barn, plus about $7,500 in lost revenue because of a two-month shortening of the tourism season. [22]
2015: Car barn museum (Walt Laurie Memorial Museum) opened, displaying artifacts and photos within a dedicated space and also throughout the barn. [23] 2024: 100 years of Streetcar 23 in Nelson.
The non-profit Nelson Electric Tramway Society (NETS), which adopted the name of the town's first streetcar company, was the first operating heritage streetcar line in BC. Since the closure of the Vancouver Downtown Historic Railway in 2011, only one other system remains (Fraser Valley Heritage Railway). The Nelson Electric Tramway is the only one that is powered by an overhead wire.
The single-track railway runs along Nelson's waterfront from a loop under the orange bridge (at the northeast end of Rotary Heritage Park) to a loop at Hall St. (adjacent to the northeast perimeter of the airport). The society has two restored vintage streetcars. The service is seasonal, starting on the May long weekend and ending on the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend. [24]
Car 23 was built in 1906 by the John Stephenson Company (then owned by the J. G. Brill Company) for Cleveland, Ohio's short-lived Forest City Railway (fleet No. 3334). [25] in 1908 the car was renumbered to 934 and converted to single end operation. The car was purchased in 1924 by the City of Nelson and used as a spare car, bringing the fleet total to 3 streetcars, the smallest in the British Empire. In 1930 the car was renumbered from "3" to "23", [26] and it remained in service until the 1949 closure of the system. The body of the car was used as a dog kennel, skating rink shelter and a craft shop. Acquired in poor condition in 1982, the car body was restored by students at Selkirk College. Later, replica trucks were fabricated, so that the car could be returned to operating condition. [25] Streetcar 23 made its first revenue service on July 1, 1992.
Birney-type car 400 was originally ordered in 1921 by the British Columbia Electric Railway (BCER) from the Preston Car Company. The car was manufactured in Preston, Ontario, and shipped in parts to the BCER for final assembly at their yards in Vancouver before entering service in Victoria, British Columbia in March 1922. The car was retired from service in 1948, then sold to the Mayo Lumber Company in Cowichan Lake to be used as a bunkhouse. Purchased in 1970 by the provincial transportation museum, in Cloverdale, the car was restored in 1973 for static display. Car 400 was leased by the Nelson Electric Tramway Society in 1990 and with the closure of the museum in 1992, Nelson became Car 400's permanent home. Car 400 is not in regular service, as it’s short wheelbase can not make it around the sharp curvature of the terminus loops. All scheduled trips use car 23.
{{cite magazine}}
: Cite magazine requires |magazine=
(help)A tram 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. Due to their close similarities, trams are commonly included in the wider term light rail, which also includes systems separated from other traffic.
A heritage railway or heritage railroad is a railway operated as living history to re-create or preserve railway scenes of the past. Heritage railways are often old railway lines preserved in a state depicting a period in the history of rail transport.
The British Columbia Electric Railway (BCER) was an historic railway which operated in southwestern British Columbia, Canada. Originally the parent company for, and later a division of, BC Electric Company, the BCER assumed control of existing streetcar and interurban lines in southwestern British Columbia in 1897, and operated the electric railway systems in the region until the last interurban service was discontinued in 1958. During and after the streetcar era, BC Electric also ran bus and trolleybus systems in Greater Vancouver and bus service in Greater Victoria; these systems subsequently became part of BC Transit, and the routes in Greater Vancouver eventually came under the control of TransLink. Trolley buses still run in the City of Vancouver with one line extending into Burnaby.
A Birney or Birney Safety Car is a type of streetcar that was manufactured in the United States in the 1910s and 1920s. The design was small and light and was intended to be an economical means of providing frequent service at a lower infrastructure and labor cost than conventional streetcars. Production of Birney cars lasted from 1915 until 1930, and more than 6,000 of the original, single-truck version were built. Several different manufacturers built Birney cars. The design was "the first mass-produced standard streetcar " in North America.
The Nelson and Fort Sheppard Railway (N&FS) is a historic railway that operated in the West Kootenay region of southern British Columbia. The railway's name derived from a misspelling of Fort Shepherd, a former Hudson's Bay Company fort, on the west bank of the Columbia River immediately north of the border.
The San Diego Electric Railway (SDERy) was a mass transit system in Southern California, United States, using 600 volt DC streetcars and buses.
BC Transit is a provincial Crown corporation responsible for coordinating the delivery of public transportation within British Columbia, Canada, outside Greater Vancouver. BC Transit is headquartered in Victoria, British Columbia. In 2023, the system had a ridership of 26,377,500, or about 108,500 per weekday as of the first quarter of 2024.
Old Pueblo Trolley is a non-profit, educational corporation based in Tucson, in the U.S. state of Arizona, that is dedicated to the preservation of Arizona's mass transit history. The name also commonly refers to the heritage streetcar line which OPT began operating in 1993, on which service is currently indefinitely suspended. OPT consists of three divisions that each fill a specific role in preserving the state's mass transit history. The divisions are the Street Railway Division, Motor Bus Division and the Museum Division.
Streetcars in Washington, D.C. transported people across the city and region from 1862 until 1962.
The Fort Collins Municipal Railway operated streetcars in Fort Collins, Colorado, from 1919 until 1951. Since 1984, a section of one of the former routes has been in operation as a seasonal heritage streetcar service, under the same name, running primarily on Spring and Summer weekends. The heritage service is operated by volunteers from the Fort Collins Municipal Railway Society (FCMRS). The streetcar in use on the heritage line, Birney "Safety" Streetcar No. 21, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Streetcars were part of the public transit service in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in the first third of the 20th century, and returned to this role in the year 2000.
Pittsburgh Railways was one of the predecessors of Pittsburgh Regional Transit. It had 666 PCC cars, the third largest fleet in North America. It had 68 streetcar routes, of which only three are used by the Port Authority as light rail routes. With the Port Authority's Transit Development Plan, many route names will be changed to its original, such as the 41D Brookline becoming the 39 Brookline. Many of the streetcar routes have been remembered in the route names of many Port Authority 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 or trolley(car)s were once the chief mode of public transit in hundreds of North American cities and towns. Most of the original urban streetcar systems were either dismantled in the mid-20th century or converted to other modes of operation, such as light rail. Today, only Toronto still operates a streetcar network essentially unchanged in layout and mode of operation.
The Omaha and Council Bluffs Railway and Bridge Company, known as O&CB, was incorporated in 1886 in order to connect Omaha, Nebraska with Council Bluffs, Iowa over the Missouri River. With a sanctioned monopoly over streetcar service in the two cities, the O&CB was among the earliest major electric street railway systems in the nation, and was one of the last streetcar operators in the U.S., making its last run in 1955.
The Astoria Riverfront Trolley is a 3-mile (4.8 km) heritage streetcar line that operates in Astoria, Oregon, United States, using former freight railroad tracks along or near the south bank of the Columbia River, with no overhead line. The service began operating in 1999, using a 1913-built streetcar from San Antonio, Texas. As of 2012, the service was reported as carrying 35,000 to 40,000 passengers per year and has been called a "symbol" and "icon" of Astoria. The line's operation is seasonal, normally during spring break and from May through September.
The Charlottesville and Albemarle Railway (C&A) was a short electric street railroad operating within the city of Charlottesville, Virginia, United States, during the early 20th century. The line was preceded by several streetcar lines operating both horse-drawn and electric powered cars dating back to 1887. After facing financial difficulties, the predecessor lines were reorganized into the C&A in 1903. The C&A's electric streetcars operated off of an overhead line system that was powered by the railroad's own power plant. The C&A also offered electric power generated by its plant to the city of Charlottesville. During the mid-1910s, the line received numerous upgrades, including the construction of a new power plant on the Rivanna River, a new company headquarters building, expansion of track, and the purchase of new streetcars.
The Fraser Valley Heritage Railway Society (FVHRS) restores and operates historic interurban streetcar in Surrey, British Columbia. The organization was formed in 2001 and the heritage streetcar system began in June 2013. It is one of two operating historical tramways in the province.
The Steveston Tram Museum is a rail museum in Steveston, BC. The museum houses one of seven remaining interurban streetcars that previously operated as part of the BC Electric Railway.