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The first trolleybus vehicle in Russia was built in Saint Petersburg in 1902 at Frese machine-building factory. It utilised a carriage-type current collector like the early von Siemens prototypes. There was no attempt to organize passenger or cargo services at this time.
The first operational trolleybus service was introduced in 1933 in Moscow. In Soviet cities with underground metropolitan railways, trolleybus systems were intended to replace tramcars. In reality such plans were partially performed in the 1950s rather than in the 1930s. The first Soviet-made passenger trolleybus LK-1 was named after Politburo member Lazar Kaganovich. It was a dangerous and unreliable vehicle, quickly replaced by more advanced YaTB vehicles. These cars, both passenger and cargo, were the mainstay of the Soviet trolley fleet before the World War II. At this time new trolleybus systems were opened in Leningrad, Kyiv, and a few other major Soviet cities.
During World War II, new trolleybus systems were opened in the Soviet Union. The need for mass transit in cities away from the front was urgent, but construction of tram lines was too expensive and time-consuming. Buses were largely mobilised to the Red Army as staff and medical vehicles. The remains of the bus fleet quickly stalled due to fuel shortages. The trolleybuses proved a good solution. Some vehicles, wires and other equipment were evacuated from Moscow in 1941; these materials were used for erecting new lines and systems in other cities. In the front-line city of Leningrad, trolleybus service ceased operations in November 1941 and was not restored until the end of the war. City trams were relaunched in April 1942 and performed without interruption under siege conditions. This restored Soviet plans of mass transit development in the form of co-existence of subways, trams, and trolleys.
The postwar period saw an explosion of development and expansion of trolleybus systems in the Soviet Union. Many cities and towns introduced passenger and cargo trolleybus services, sometimes interfering with tram operations. One of the most notable of these new trolleybus systems was the Crimean Trolleybus, currently the world's longest trolleybus line. Production at the time was limited to the monopoly Zavod imeni Uritskogo (ZiU, named after Moisei Uritsky). It produced thousands of MTB-82, ZiU-5, and ZiU-9 passenger trolleybuses for domestic purposes and for export. ZiU-5s and ZiU-9s were sold to Greece, Colombia, Argentina and Eastern Bloc countries. Three ZiU-9 cars were on loan in 1973 for testing purposes in Helsinki, Finland.
The collapse of the Soviet Union led to insufficient funding for many municipal trolleybus systems, but they proved more resilient than municipal tram or bus operations. Within the area of modern Russia, there are two closed trolleybus systems, in Shakhty (whose operations ceased in October 2007) and Moscow on 26 August 2020. The suspended trolleybus operations from October 2006 in Archangelsk were reactivated in December 2007. The trolleybus system in Grozny was completely destroyed in the First Chechen War; reconstruction is in planning. There is also one system with uncertain futures, in Voronezh. In other cities the development of trolleybus passenger services continues. Two new systems were introduced in Moscow suburbs Khimki and Vidnoe in the second half of the 1990s. ZiU, now named Trolza, has lost its monopoly in producing trolley vehicles. Today a number of domestic factories offer trolleybuses for the Russian market.
A trolleybus is an electric bus that draws power from dual overhead wires using spring-loaded trolley poles. Two wires, and two trolley poles, are required to complete the electrical circuit. This differs from a tram or streetcar, which normally uses the track as the return path, needing only one wire and one pole. They are also distinct from other kinds of electric buses, which usually rely on batteries. Power is most commonly supplied as 600-volt direct current, but there are exceptions.
Budapesti Közlekedési Zrt. or BKV Zrt. is the main public transport operator in Budapest, Hungary. BKV was established in 1968 as a unified public transport company with the merger of the companies responsible for the different means of transport; bus operator FAÜ, tram and trolleybus operator FVV, suburban railway operator BHÉV and riverboat operator FHV. The metro was added in 1973. The transport in Budapest underwent another reorganization in 2010 when the BKK was founded for the management of the city transport and infrastructure.
Marshrutka or marshrutnoe taksi or routed taxicab, are share taxis found in Eastern Europe and the republics of the former Soviet Union. Usually vans, they drive along set routes, depart only when all seats are filled, and may have higher fares than buses. Passengers can board a marshrutka anywhere along its route if there are seats available.
MTV-82 is a Soviet four-axle tramcar.
The ZiU-5 is a Soviet trolleybus model that was built by the Uritsky factory. The ZiU acronym stands for Zavod imeni Uritskogo, which translates as Plant named after Uritskiy. This model of city trolleybus was in mass production from 1959 to 1972. The total number of ZiU-5s produced exceeded 14,500 vehicles. This allowed the ZiU-5 to become dominant model of trolleybus in Soviet towns and cities of that time. The last vehicles were withdrawn from active service in the mid-1980s. The small number of surviving vehicles are kept now for museum purposes.
Trams in Saint Petersburg are a major mode of public transit in the city of Saint Petersburg, Russia. Saint Petersburg once had the second-largest tram network in the world, consisting of about 340 kilometres (210 mi) of unduplicated track in the late 1980s. However, since 1995 the tramway network has declined sharply in size as major portions of track were removed, particularly in the city centre. Saint Petersburg lost its record to Melbourne, Australia. While it still had 285 kilometres (177 mi) of length in 2002, by early 2007 the tram network's had declined to just over 220 kilometres (140 mi), and by the 2010s operated on just 205.5 kilometres (127.7 mi) of network.
ZiU-9, or ZIU-9 is a Soviet trolleybus. Other names for the ZiU-9 are ZiU-682 and HTI-682. The ZiU acronym stands for Zavod imeni Uritskogo, which is a plant named after Moisei Uritsky, the Russian revolutionary. Before 1996 this acronym was also a trademark of the vehicle manufacturer Trolza. The ZiU-9 was first built in 1966, although it was only put into mass production in 1972 and it was still assembled along with other more advanced trolleybus vehicles in the Trolza factory until 2015. The total number of produced ZiU-9s exceeds 42,000 vehicles making it the most produced trolleybus in the world. In addition, many copies of ZiU-9 were made in other factories of the former Soviet bloc.
Verkehrsbetriebe Zürich (VBZ) is a public transport operator in the Swiss city of Zürich, and is wholly owned by the city. Previously known as the Städtische Strassenbahn Zürich (StStZ), the organisation was founded in 1896 and adopted its current name in 1950.
GSP Belgrade is a public transit company in the city of Belgrade. As of 2018, it operates with 170 lines and has 1,611 active vehicles.
The Dushanbe trolleybus system forms part of the public transport network of Dushanbe, the capital and largest city of Tajikistan. In operation since 1955. The system presently comprises eight routes as of 2006.
The Yerevan trolleybus system forms part of the public transport network in Yerevan, the capital city of Armenia. Since the closure of the Gyumri trolleybus system in 2005, it has been Armenia’s only trolleybus system.
The Philadelphia trolleybus system forms part of the public transportation network serving Philadelphia, in the state of Pennsylvania, United States. It opened on October 14, 1923, and is now the second-longest-lived trolleybus system in the world. One of only five such systems currently operating in the U.S., it presently comprises three lines, and is operated by the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA), with a fleet of 38 trolleybuses, or trackless trolleys as SEPTA calls them. The three surviving routes serve North and Northeast Philadelphia and connect with SEPTA's Market–Frankford rapid transit line.
The Córdoba trolleybus system is part of the public transport network in Córdoba, the capital city of Córdoba Province, Argentina.
The Bern trolleybus system is part of the public transport network of Bern, the capital city of Switzerland. Opened in 1940, it combines with the Bern S-Bahn, the Bern tramway network and Bern's urban motorbus network to form an integrated all-four style scheme.
The Ruse trolleybus system is a part of the public transport network of the city and municipality of Ruse, the fifth most populous in Bulgaria. Opened in 1988, the system currently has seven lines and forms the backbone of the city's transport system. Its approximate length is 63 km and has been designed to work with 600V DC electricity. Over the years, various models of trolleybuses have been operated in Ruse.
The Singapore trolleybus system formed part of the transportation network of Singapore from 1926 to 1962. The system was constructed between 1926 and 1927 as a replacement to the Singapore tramway network with the old tram routes converted to trolleybus routes. The network became one of the world's largest in the 1930s, with a total network length of 24.96 miles (40.17 km) and fleet of 108 trolleybuses.
As of 2012 there were around 300 cities or metropolitan areas where trolleybuses were operated, and more than 500 additional trolleybus systems have existed in the past. For complete lists of trolleybus systems by location, with dates of opening and closure, see List of trolleybus systems and the related lists indexed there.
The Ganja trolleybus system was a system of trolleybuses forming part of the public transport arrangements in Ganja, the second most populous city in Azerbaijan, for most of the second half of the 20th century.
The Chișinău trolleybus system forms an important part of the public transport network in Chișinău, the capital of Moldova. The system was created shortly after the end of the World War II to replace the old electric tram system that suffered extensive damage during the war. Along with the network of minibuses known as rutierele, it forms the backbone of the Chișinău transport system, with the average daily ridership reaching 250,000 passengers per day.
The production of urban electric transport is a branch of Russian engineering. Russia has the largest number of trolley (85) and tram systems (86) in the world.