Public transport pic thread

[Bostech]

Post some weird,unusal,strange or just cool pictures of public transportations.

Here are some to begin with.

Bosnia or Croatia ,guy hanging at back of full tram.
They sure love their public transport.



Somewhere in Austria. :-)



British I believe.




Just cool...Spain I believe.

[Bostech]

Someone left door open in Russia. :-)




No pants day on US subway.




Tram in dt Zagreb in night.

[Bostech]

Bit crowded in Japan.

[Dog Walker]

Gotta love the piggy bank! 

Stand back, Bos.  Oklawaha must have a server room full of pictures of transportation of all sorts and you are about to see the great mother of all photo slapdowns.

Can't wait!

[CS Foltz]

Dog Walker..........I agree! I would bet Ock has transportation vehicles dating back to oxcarts!

[Lunican]

US Senate Subway







http://www.paleofuture.com/blog/2009/4/6/us-senate-monorail-1912.html

[Ocklawaha]

Dog Walker..........I agree! I would bet Ock has transportation vehicles dating back to oxcarts!

LaVilla "Rapid Transit" 1890.  Actually this is probably a local delivery service working from our first Union Station.

The tree line ended about where I-95 is today, though there were still spotty trees in LaVilla well into the 1960's. West of I-95 was two cross-roads neighborhoods, "The Brick Yard" (roughly where Myrtle goes under the railroad today) and "Brick Church," around where Beaver Street goes over the railroad.  Both Brick Yard, and Brick Church were involved in battles during The War of Yankee Aggression. When things got to hot to handle by the US Army, a massive earthworks was thrown up from the mouth of McCoys Creek to: Union Terminal, to Davis and Union, to Main and Hogans Creek, to Union and Hogans Creek, to the mouth of Hogans Creek.  The first Confederate officer to fall was in the "Battle of Brick Church," an infantry fight.  The other battle was called "The Battle of McCoys Creek," it was a running calvary fight. The Ox Cart highways were quickly replaced by "The Jacksonville and LaVilla Street Railway."

Nice shots Bos, keep em coming.

OCKLAWAHA

[Dog Walker]

Ock, take a look at that Spanish tram that Bos posted.  The doors are really close to the ground and eliminate the need for a platform or climbing steps or kneeling buses.  I presume that they are so low to the ground because there is no running gear or motors under the passenger compartments.

Do they use hub motors in the wheels or something like that for power or is there some sort of tractor, first car?

[kellypope]

Coyote on the subway in Portland. This seat taken?

[coredumped]

m497 black beetle jet train!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M497

More pictures: http://thecontaminated.com/m-497-jettrain/

[Bostech]

And when you put these two together,you get this.

[Ocklawaha]

Ock, take a look at that Spanish tram that Bos posted.  The doors are really close to the ground and eliminate the need for a platform or climbing steps or kneeling buses.  I presume that they are so low to the ground because there is no running gear or motors under the passenger compartments.

Do they use hub motors in the wheels or something like that for power or is there some sort of tractor, first car?

This is one of the wheel assemblies from the Seattle SLUT. From streetcars to Diesel electric's the power motor is generally along the axle, between the wheels. On locomotives, as the wheels are darn near man size, one can get an idea of the size of electric motors slung beneath the floor.

Dog Walker, this is one of the new LOW-FLOOR streetcars, in use in the USA as well as Europe. As a bit of background, STREETCARS and Electric Interurban Railroads, buses and trolley boats, are all rooted in an American Invention.

Frank Sprague, born in CT in 1857, became a Navy Ensign, where he invented the shipboard dynamo. He worked for Edison's labs, and using math rather then tinkering (something aparently not appreciated by the boss) he invented the constant speed, spark less, electric motor, which used brushes (today's motors are virtually unchanged from Sprague's invention). He left Edison and moved to Richmond, Virginia, a city with 100 hills, and every one of them a 0-10% grade, making for a nearly impossible situation for the mule drawn streetcars.  In an idea perhaps founded in sports fishing, Sprague invented a trolling pulley on an electric wire above the street. The pulley was connected to the streetcar with a rope cable, exactly as a fisherman "Trolls for Fish." The pulley evolved into Spragues spring loaded "Trollin' Pole" in 1880, and within a couple of years that phrase was corrupted into the common term TROLLEY. In 1884, Sprague founded The Sprague Electric Railway & Motor Company. In 1887-88, track laying was complete and the new Railway demonstrated the ability to climb hills without cable cars!   It was a unbelievable success, and his patents spread like a wild fire across the USA and the world. By 1886, Sprague, had engineered a way to return power to the lines using what would someday become Dynamic Braking and Regeneration. By 1889, over 110 railways had converted to the Sprague system, including The JACKSONVILLE STREET RAILWAY, MAIN STREET RAILWAY, JACKSONVILLE AND LAVILLA STREET RAILWAY.

Several designs came out in the very early 1900's for a low floor streetcar, that would be attractive to "little ladies."  It was felt that the "fairer sex" needed relief from the 3 or 4 step climb to floor level.  Another driving factor was the enormous number of elderly crippled men that populated our country between 1900 and 1940. These men were veterans of The War of Yankee Aggression, and to give you an idea, fully 1/3 of the state budget of Mississippi during this time went into the purchase of prosthetic arms and legs for our aging Confederates.

The most successful of these cars was known as the PETER WITT, many were built from 1925-30. Take a Photo Tour:


1928 Model, Peter Witt, low floor, center door car on the "F" line in San Francisco.


A Bingham/Belt Line Peter Witt from the TTC in Canada, Do these boyz know how to restore a streetcar!


This is the "cheat sheet" showing the private parts of a classic Peter Witt.




Several Variations, two railroads, two gauges, ONE CITY - HOLLYWOOD CA. The LA RY narrow gauge Peter Witt Yellow Car, is turning on Hollywood Bl, for the tunnel. Slightly ahead of it the standard gauge Interurban Pacific Electric "Hollywood" car is heading into the tunnel, and hence the Subway into downtown LA. In the background, across the intersection, one can see another "Hollywood Car", maybe young OCK was inside? These were the first rails that I ever explored or rode.


GOT SPACE? This old view of a PE Hollywood Car, is WAY DIFFERENT then JTA's new BRT buses.


After GENERAL MOTORS, FIRESTONE, GOODYEAR, PHILLIPS, STANDARD OIL'S, "NATIONAL CITY LINES", bought out the Pacific Electric's 1,200 miles of LRT/Interurban in the Los Angeles basin, they couldn't wait to change over to freeway based transportation and buses.  Meanwhile down on Terminal Island (PORT OF LOS ANGELES/LONG BEACH) THIS is what they did to the old public servants. The Pacific Electric built Los Angeles, the entire basin was one giant TOD, the public was outraged to the point of open revolt, but for the PE, it was over in 1963 and the wires came down.


This beautiful shot of another Hollywood Car, on some of the hundreds of miles of private track still in operation in the late 50's and into the edge of the 1960's. Check out that paint scheme on the old gal and remember it.


Fast forward 35 years and BILLIONS of dollars later, and one can get a hint of what that public demanded. "The Public doesn't want rail, they HATE rail..." Mike Miller at the JTA/BRT Community Meetings... SURE THEY DO MIKE! WHY THE EVIDENCE OF THE ROMANCE IT WRITTEN ALL OVER THE FACE OF THIS NEW LOS ANGELES, LRV.


The local news media in Los Angeles also hates rail... Uh? Oh! Read it and weep Mike!


So what can we do in Jacksonville? Well for starters, look in every back yard, side yard, farm and lot from St. Augustine to Starke to Valdosta to Savannah... all area's known to have hidden some of Jacksonvilles retired trolleys. Oh and GUESS WHAT IS IN THIS BOX? YEP! All 57,000 pounds of it!

OCKLAWAHA

[Lunican]

Blackpool Boat Tram in San Francisco.

[subro]

Standing room only....

[Jason]

Excellent thead idea Bos!


Keep 'em comming!