Light rail is a form of passenger urban rail transit that uses rolling stock derived from tram technology while also having some features from heavy rapid transit.
The interurban is a type of electric railway, with tram-like electric self-propelled railcars which run within and between cities or towns. The term "interurban" is usually used in North America, with other terms used outside it. They were very prevalent in many parts of the world before the Second World War and were used primarily for passenger travel between cities and their surrounding suburban and rural communities. Interurban as a term encompassed the companies, their infrastructure, their cars that ran on the rails, and their service. In the United States, the early 1900s interurban was a valuable economic institution, when most roads between towns, many town streets were unpaved, and transportation and haulage was by horse-drawn carriages and carts.
The Alstom Citadis is a family of low-floor trams and light rail vehicles built by Alstom. As of 2017, over 2,300 Citadis trams have been sold and 1,800 tramways are in revenue service throughout the world, with operations in all six inhabited continents. An evolution of Alstom's earlier TFS vehicle, most Citadis vehicles are made in Alstom's factories in La Rochelle, Reichshoffen and Valenciennes, France, and in Barcelona, Spain, and Annaba, Algeria.
The Bombardier Flexity Swift is a series of urban and inter-urban tram, light rail and light metro vehicles manufactured by Bombardier Transportation. It is part of the Bombardier Flexity family of rail vehicles, and like the others, Flexity Swift vehicles can be customized to suit the needs and requirements of customers including legacy designs from its acquisition of Adtranz.
Urban rail transit is a wide term for various types of local rail systems providing passenger service within and around urban or suburban areas. The set of urban rail systems can be roughly subdivided into the following categories, which sometimes overlap because some systems or lines have aspects of multiple types.
Various terms are used for passenger railway lines and equipment; the usage of these terms differs substantially between areas:
The Karlsruhe model is a tram-train system which consists of tram/light rail trains and commuter/regional rail trains running on the same set of tracks, generally between or outside of urban areas. It was initially developed and implemented in the city of Karlsruhe, Germany, by the local transit authority, Karlsruher Verkehrsverbund (KVV).
The Zwickau model, or train-tram, is an inversion of the tram-train. Instead of tram vehicles running on railway tracks, the Zwickau model features main-line trains extended through city streets on tram tracks. The trains have only minor modifications to permit use on the tram tracks. It is so called because the German city of Zwickau was the first to introduce the concept.
Stadtbahn is a German word referring to various types of urban rail transport. One type of transport originated in the 19th century, firstly in Berlin and followed by Vienna, where rail routes were created that could be used independently from other traffic.
Europe has an extensive number of tramway networks. Some of these networks have been upgraded to light rail standards, called Stadtbahn in Germany, premetros in Belgium, sneltram in the Netherlands, metro ligeiro in Portugal and fast trams in some other countries.
Germany has an extensive number of tramway networks. Some of these networks have been upgraded to light rail standards, called Stadtbahn in German. Straßenbahn and Stadtbahn schemes are usually operated on the legal foundation of the BOStrab, the Tramways Act of Germany.
Although tram and Heritage streetcar systems date to the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many old systems were closed during the mid-20th century because of the advent of automobile travel. This was especially the case in North America, but postwar reductions and shutdowns also occurred on British, French and other Western European urban rail networks. However, traditional tramway systems survived, and eventually even began to thrive from the late 20th century onward, some eventually operating as much as when they were first built over a century ago. Their numbers have been augmented by modern tramway or light rail systems in cities which had discarded this form of transport.
Rapid transit in Germany consists of four U-Bahn systems and 14 S-Bahn systems. The U-Bahn, commonly understood to stand for Untergrundbahn, are conventional rapid transit systems that run mostly underground, while the S-Bahn or Stadtschnellbahn are commuter rail services, that may run underground in the city center and have metro-like characteristics in Munich, Hamburg and Berlin which they only have to a lesser extent in other cities. There are also over a dozen semi-metro or Stadtbahn systems that are rapid transit in the city center and light rail outside.
The Kassel tramway network is a 93.3-kilometer (58.0 mi) network of tramways, forming part of the public transport system in Kassel, a city in the north of the federal state of Hesse, Germany. As of 2014, the Kassel tram network is made up of seven regular tramlines.
The Saarbahn is a regional Stadtbahn operating on the tram-train principle in the German state of the Saarland. It consists of a core line in Saarbrücken and Riegelsberg operating under tram operating procedures (BOStrab), connected to two lines that are operated under railway operating procedures (EBO), the Lebach–Völklingen railway to the north and the Saarbrücken–Sarreguemines railway in the south. Stadtbahn Saar GmbH is responsible for the infrastructure of the central section of line, while the outer tracks are operated by the national railway infrastructure companies, DB Netz AG in Germany and Réseau Ferré de France in France. The system is operated by Saarbahn GmbH, and integrated in the Saarländischer Verkehrsverbund (SaarVV).
The Kassel RegioTram is a 184-kilometer (114 mi) tram-train light rail system in Kassel, Hesse, Germany.
The Alstom Flexity is a family of trams, streetcars, and light rail vehicles manufactured by Bombardier Transportation until 2021, when French company Alstom took over Bombardier. As of 2015, more than 3,500 Flexity vehicles are in operation around the world in Europe, Asia, Oceania, and North America in 100 cities among 20 countries internationally. Production of the vehicles is done at Bombardier's global production plants and by local manufacturers worldwide through technology transfer agreements.
The Stadler Citylink is a series of tram-trains manufactured by Stadler Rail at its Valencia factory since 2011. The design was introduced by Vossloh España before their takeover by Stadler Rail in 2015. They are currently used in Germany, Hungary, Mexico, Spain and the United Kingdom, with more on order in Austria. Stadler opened a new factory in the United States in 2016, which is in the process of building up to 80 Citylink vehicles for service in Salt Lake City beginning in 2028.
Semi-metro is a form of urban rail transport in which trams run partly on a conflict-free track, by using tunnels and viaducts. These stretches of track are designed to function like a regular metro or rapid transit line. Semi-metro lines run with tram cars because they are usually developed from an existing tram network. Semi-metro is a concept also known as a subway–surface line/system, tram subway line/system, trolley subway system or a hybrid streetcar / light rail line)
