A monorail is a railway in which the track consists of a single rail or a beam.
A rubber-tyred metro or rubber-tired metro is a form of rapid transit system that uses a mix of road and rail technology. The vehicles have wheels with rubber tires that run on rolling pads inside guide bars for traction, as well as traditional railway steel wheels with deep flanges on steel tracks for guidance through conventional switches as well as guidance in case a tyre fails. Most rubber-tyred trains are purpose-built and designed for the system on which they operate. Guided buses are sometimes referred to as 'trams on tyres', and compared to rubber-tyred metros.
Véhicule Automatique Léger or VAL is a type of driverless (automated), rubber-tyred, medium-capacity rail transport system. The technology was developed at the Lille University of Science and Technology, was marketed by Matra, and first used in the early 1980s for the Lille Metro system, one of the world's first fully automated mass-transit rail networks, preceded only by the Port Island Line in Kobe, Japan. The VAL technology is now marketed by Siemens, which acquired Matra in the late 1990s.
A third rail, also known as a live rail, electric rail or conductor rail, is a method of providing electric power to a railway locomotive or train, through a semi-continuous rigid conductor placed alongside or between the rails of a railway track. It is used typically in a mass transit or rapid transit system, which has alignments in its own corridors, fully or almost fully segregated from the outside environment. Third-rail systems are usually supplied from direct current electricity.
An automated guideway transit (AGT) or automated fixed-guideway transit or automatic guideway transit system is a type of fixed guideway transit infrastructure with a riding or suspension track that supports and physically guides one or more driverless vehicles along its length. The vehicles are often rubber tired or steel wheeled, but other traction systems including air cushion, suspended monorail and maglev have been implemented. The guideway provides both physical support, like a road, as well as the guidance.
The median strip, central reservation, roadway median, or traffic median is the reserved area that separates opposing lanes of traffic on divided roadways such as divided highways, dual carriageways, freeways, and motorways. The term also applies to divided roadways other than highways, including some major streets in urban or suburban areas. The reserved area may simply be paved, but commonly it is adapted to other functions; for example, it may accommodate decorative landscaping, trees, a median barrier, or railway, rapid transit, light rail, or streetcar lines.
Guard rail, guardrails, or protective guarding, in general, are a boundary feature and may be a means to prevent or deter access to dangerous or off-limits areas while allowing light and visibility in a greater way than a fence. Common shapes are flat, rounded edge, and tubular in horizontal railings, whereas tetraform spear-headed or ball-finialled are most common in vertical railings around homes. Park and garden railings commonly in metalworking feature swirls, leaves, plate metal areas and/or motifs particularly on and beside gates.
Guided Light Transit was the name of guided bus technology and associated infrastructure designed and manufactured by Bombardier Transportation. It was installed in two French cities: Nancy and Caen. The Caen system was closed in 2017 and replaced by conventional trams, while the Nancy system was closed in March 2023 and is to be replaced by trolleybuses.
Translohr is a rubber-tyred tramway system, originally developed by Lohr Industrie of France and now run by a consortium of Alstom Transport and Fonds stratégique d'investissement (FSI) as newTL, which took over from Lohr in 2012. It is used in Paris and Clermont-Ferrand, France; Medellín, Colombia; Tianjin and Shanghai, China; and Venice-Mestre and Padua in Italy. In June 2012, Alstom Group and the Strategic Investment Fund acquired Translohr for €35 million.
Traffic barriers keep vehicles within their roadway and prevent them from colliding with dangerous obstacles such as boulders, sign supports, trees, bridge abutments, buildings, walls, and large storm drains, or from traversing steep (non-recoverable) slopes or entering deep water. They are also installed within medians of divided highways to prevent errant vehicles from entering the opposing carriageway of traffic and help to reduce head-on collisions. Some of these barriers, designed to be struck from either side, are called median barriers. Traffic barriers can also be used to protect vulnerable areas like school yards, pedestrian zones, and fuel tanks from errant vehicles.
A wheelset is a pair of railroad vehicle wheels mounted rigidly on an axle such that both wheels rotate in unison. Wheelsets are often mounted in a bogie – a pivoted frame assembly holding at least two wheelsets – at each end of the vehicle. Most modern freight cars and passenger cars have bogies each with two wheelsets, but three wheelsets are used in bogies of freight cars that carry heavy loads, and three-wheelset bogies are under some passenger cars. Four-wheeled goods wagons that were once near-universal in Europe and Great Britain and their colonies have only two wheelsets; in recent decades such vehicles have become less common as trainloads have become heavier.
TEDA Modern Guided Rail Tram is a Translohr Light Rail line in Tianjin Economic-Technological Development Area (TEDA). It is a modern, high-speed rubber-tyred tram line, both first in China and Asia. The line is considered as part of the Tianjin Metro system. It is run by Tianjin Binhai Mass Transit Development Co., Ltd, which has been a subsidiary of Tianjin Rail Transit Group Corporation since 2017.
A current collector is a device used in trolleybuses, trams, electric locomotives and EMUs to carry electric power (current) from overhead lines, electric third rails, or ground-level power supplies to the electrical equipment of the vehicles. Those for overhead wires are roof-mounted devices, those for rails are mounted on the bogies.
A rubber-tyred tram is a development of the guided bus in which a vehicle is guided by a fixed rail in the road surface and draws current from overhead electric wires.
Trams in France date from 1837 when a 15 km steam tram line connected Montrond-les-Bains and Montbrison in the Loire. With the development of electric trams at the end of the 19th century, networks proliferated in French cities over a period of 15 years. Although nearly all of the country's tram systems were replaced by bus services in the 1930s or shortly after the Second World War, France is now in the forefront of the revival of tramways and light rail systems around the globe. Only tram lines in Lille and Saint-Étienne have operated continuously since the 19th century; the Marseille tramway system ran continuously until 2004 and only closed then for 3 years for extensive refurbishment into a modern tram network. Since the opening of the Nantes tramway in 1985, more than twenty towns and cities across France have built new tram lines. As of 2020, there are 29 operational tram networks in France, with 3 more planned. France is also home to Alstom, a leading tram manufacturer.
The Sapporo Municipal Subway is a mostly-underground rubber-tyred rapid transit system in Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan. Operated by the Sapporo City Transportation Bureau, it is the only subway system on the island of Hokkaido.
The rubber-tyred metro systems that incorporate 1,435 mmstandard gauge track have angle irons as guide bars, or guiding bars, outside of the two roll ways. The Busan Subway Line 4, that lacks a rail track, has I-beams installed as guide bars. The flanges are vertical. The Sapporo Municipal Subway, that lacks a rail track as well, has no guide bars. It has a central guide rail instead. Guide bars are also used to provide guidance for guided buses.
A roll way or running pad is the pad placed on a concrete slab or on the ties on the outside of the 1,435 mm conventional track along both running rails of a rubber-tyred metro or along the unconventional track of a tram. The rubber-tyred wheels roll directly on the roll ways.
A train wheel or rail wheel is a type of wheel specially designed for use on railway tracks. The wheel acts as a rolling component, typically press fitted onto an axle and mounted directly on a railway carriage or locomotive, or indirectly on a bogie, also called a truck. The powered wheels under the locomotive are called driving wheels. Wheels are initially cast or forged and then heat-treated to have a specific hardness. New wheels are machined using a lathe to a standardized shape, called a profile, before being installed onto an axle. All wheel profiles are regularly checked to ensure proper interaction between the wheel and the rail. Incorrectly profiled wheels and worn wheels can increase rolling resistance, reduce energy efficiency and may even cause a derailment. The International Union of Railways has defined a standard wheel diameter of 920 mm (36 in), although smaller sizes are used in some rapid transit railway systems and on ro-ro carriages.
The Ayacucho Tram is a Translohr tram system that serves the Metropolitan Area of the Aburrá Valley in Medellín, Antioquia, Colombia. It started trial operations on 20 October 2015. The tramline consists of 9 stations with three of those allowing interchanges with the Medellín Metro and the Metrocable systems. The Ayacucho Tram is operated by Medellín Metro and is the only tram in Colombia.
