I saw that for some odd FTA rule that Streetcars are not allowed to MU? PCC cars on the Shaker Rapid had MU and I think Pittsburgh did too but I am nor sure. NOLA needs to MU but there cars dont even have couplers.
Could you give us some citation for where you saw that odd rule? I don’t know of any such rule.
Philadelphia’s Kawasaki built 1982 city division trolleys can MU, and had done so in regular service back in their early days as an experiment, but I don’t think they’ve continued the practice. You can debate whether they’re streetcars or not, but they do operate extensively in city streets.
Pittsburgh’s PCCs never had couplers. Late in their history they at least lifted the rule that if a car was disabled and needed to be towed, or pushed, by another car with a tow bar that both cars had to be taken out of service. This must have been some relief to passengers during their 30 minute off peak service.
In addition to Shaker Heights, Boston also regularly MU’d their PCCs.
Although of course not subject to FTA rules, Toronto had run some of its Peter Witt streetcars as motor-trailer sets. I assume the brakes should have used some multiple unit control. Does anybody know if they could also MU 2 motors?
Around here, NOLA is New Orleans, La. Are you talking about somewhere else? I wasn’t aware that they needed or wanted to MU.
Aren’t things like MU, etc. determined by the agency or company operating the system in that they can or will choose what they want or need. And that there are few, if any, hard and fast rules and appliances?
This was a FTA funding issue. Since trains can not replace existing bus service by FTA fiat there had to be a way to have a Fed Funded streetcar that was not a train. Go back and read the trains article in which it explains that streetcars have to be stretched out in articulated sections in order to comply with this rule.
I had asked you for a citation of the FTA rule which you say says streetcars may not MU, you now mention another FTA rule, or fiat, which you say says “trains can not replace existing bus service”. I don’t know of that rule either.
You say to “go back and read the trains article”. I must have missed that article, please let us know what issue it’s in and the article’s title.
I don’t remember reading anything that said streetcars had to be stretched out in articulated sections in order to comply with any rule, and I don’t believe just stretching a vehicle into articulated sections makes it no longer a streetcar., despite what any putative article says.
Go back and read in full this past months headline article on Streetcar Revival. I would copy and paste the
article but the hotel computer has restrictions on cut copy and paist
I finally got around to reading the article. Nowhere does it say that there’s a regulation that streetcars cannot MU. It does say that FTA funding rules once upon a time were not favorable towards streetcars because the rules did not take into account general community improvement and other fuzzy advantages streetcars are supposed to provide.
In a separate section said the article said that streetcars don’t MU and instead of running them in MU’d trains the operating entities would just add modular sections to make the articulated cars longer, but the article didn’t say why, or say if this is a requirement in somebody’s definition of streetcar or just what the current flock of streetcar revival cities have adopted as their practice.
so it sure seems to me that you’re reading a lot that’s not in the article to come to your conclusion that there’s some FTA or other rule that says streetcars can’t MU.
Shaker was not a streetcar. It was a rapid transit suburban line.
There is zero economy to an MU streetcar as the car would need to be manned/crewed anyhow. MU streetcars were tried in many cities and found to be wanting. They certainly save no money in crews. Most street railway companies instead used articulated car with a single man crew.
POP ( Proof of Payment) fare systems are in place in many city’s so that wont matter.
Excuse me please but this statement is wrong. There are examples of MU’ed streetcars in Europe, for instance in Frankfurt/Germany where their line #20 is frequently using 2 motorcars as one train, and of course, the second car is without an operator. The same goes for Duesseldorf and for Jerusalems streetcar. If you google you’ll find pictures of these systems, maybe also on Youtube. Best regards, Gerd