Animal-powered tram or streetcar
A
horsecar
,
horse-drawn tram
,
horse-drawn streetcar
(U.S.), or
horse-drawn railway
(historical), is an
animal-powered
(usually
horse
)
tram
or streetcar.
Summary
[
edit
]
The horse-drawn tram (horsecar) was an early form of
public
rail transport
, which developed out of
industrial haulage routes
that had long been in existence, and from the
omnibus
routes that first ran on public streets in the 1820s
[
citation needed
]
, using the newly improved iron or steel rail or '
tramway
'. They were local versions of the
stagecoach
lines and picked up and dropped off passengers on a regular route, without the need to be pre-hired. Horsecars on tramlines were an improvement over the omnibus, because the low
rolling resistance
of metal wheels on
iron
or
steel
rails
(usually
grooved
from 1852 on
) allowed the animals to haul a greater load for a given effort than the omnibus, and gave a smoother ride. The horse-drawn streetcar combined the low cost, flexibility, and safety of animal power with the efficiency, smoothness, and all-weather capability of a rail track. Animal power at the time was seen as safer than steam power in that early locomotives frequently suffered from
boiler explosions
. Rails were seen as all-weather because streets of the time might be poorly paved, or not paved at all, allowing wagon wheels to sink in mud during rain or snow.
History
[
edit
]
Canada
[
edit
]
In 1861,
Toronto Street Railway
horsecars replaced horse-drawn omnibuses as a public transit mode in
Toronto
. Electric streetcars later replaced the horsecars between 1892 and 1894. The Toronto Street Railway created Toronto's unique broad gauge of
4 ft
10
+
7
⁄
8
in
(
1,495 mm
). The streets were unpaved, and a
step rail
was employed. The horsecars had flanged wheels and ran on the upper level of the step. Ordinary wagons and carriages ran on the broad lower step inside. This necessitated a wider gauge. This broad
Toronto gauge
is still used today by the
Toronto streetcar system
and three lines of the
Toronto subway
.
[1]
The
Metropolitan Street Railway
operated a horsecar line in then-suburban
North Toronto
from 1885 until the line was electrified in 1890; this horsecar line also used Toronto gauge.
[2]
India
[
edit
]
The first horse-drawn trams in India ran a 2.4-mile (3.9 km) distance between
Sealdah
and Armenian Ghat Street on 24 February 1873. The service was discontinued on 20 November of that year.
[3]
The Calcutta Tramway Company was formed and registered in London on 22 December 1880. Metre-gauge horse-drawn tram tracks were laid from Sealdah to Armenian Ghat via Bowbazar Street, Dalhousie Square and Strand Road. The route was inaugurated by
Viceroy Ripon
on 1 November 1880.
[3]
In 1882, steam locomotives were deployed experimentally to haul tram cars. By the end of the 19th century the company owned 166 tram cars, 1000 horses, seven steam locomotives and 19 miles of tram tracks.
[3]
In 1900, electrification of the tramway and reconstruction of its tracks to
4 ft
8
+
1
⁄
2
in
(
1,435 mm
) (
standard gauge
) began.
[3]
In 1902, the first electric tramcar in India ran from
Esplanade
to
Kidderpore
on 27 March and on 14 June from Esplanade to
Kalighat
.
The Bombay Tramway Company was set up in 1873. After a contract was signed between the Bombay Tramway Company, the municipality and the Stearns and Kitteredge company, the Bombay Presidency enacted the Bombay Tramways Act, 1874 licensing the company to run a horsecar tram service in the city.
[4]
On 9 May 1874 the first horse-drawn carriage made its debut in the city, plying the
Colaba
?
Pydhone
via
Crawford Market
, and
Bori Bunder
to
Pydhonie
via
Kalbadevi
routes. The initial fare was three
annas
(15
paise
pre-decimalisation), and no tickets were issued. As the service became increasingly popular, the fare was reduced to two annas (10 pre-decimalisation paise). Later that year, tickets were issued to curb increasing ticket-less travel.
[5]
Stearns and Kitteredge reportedly had a stable of 1,360 horses over the lifetime of the service.
[6]
United Kingdom
[
edit
]
The first tram services in the world were started by the
Swansea and Mumbles Railway
in
Wales
, using specially designed carriages on an existing tramline built for
horse-drawn freight dandies
. Fare-paying passengers were carried on a line between
Oystermouth
,
Mumbles
and
Swansea Docks
from 1807. The
Gloucester and Cheltenham Tramroad
(1809) carried passengers although its main purpose was freight.
In spite of its early start, it took many years for horse-drawn streetcars to become widely acceptable across Britain; the American
George Francis Train
first introduced them to
Birkenhead Corporation Tramways
' predecessor in
Birkenhead
in 1860 but was jailed for "breaking and injuring" the highway when he next tried to lay the first tram tracks on the roads of
London
. An
1870 Act of Parliament
overcame these legal obstacles by defining responsibilities and for the next three decades many
local tramway companies
were founded, using horse-drawn carriages, until replaced by
cable
, steam or electric traction. Many companies adopted a design of a partly enclosed
double-decker
carriage hauled by two horses. The last horse-drawn tram was retired from London in 1915. Horses continued to be used for light shunting well into the 20th century. The last horse used for shunting on British Railways was retired on
21 February 1967
in
Newmarket, Suffolk
.
United States
[
edit
]
In the
United States
the very first streetcar appeared in New Orleans in 1832, operated by the
Pontchartrain Railroad
Company, followed by those in 1832 on the
New York and Harlem Railroad
in
New York City
.
[7]
The latter cars were designed by
John Stephenson
of
New Rochelle, New York
, and constructed at his
company
in New York City. The earliest streetcars used horses and sometimes mules, usually two as a team, to haul the cars. Rarely, other animals were tried, including humans in emergency circumstances. By the mid-1880s, there were 415 street railway companies in the US operating over 6,000 miles (9,700 km) of track and carrying 188 million passengers per year using horsecars. By 1890 New Yorkers took 297 horsecar rides per capita per year. The average street car horse had a life expectancy of about two years.
[8]
Elsewhere
[
edit
]
The first horse-drawn rail cars on the
Continental Europe
were operated from 1828 by the
?eske Bud?jovice - Linz railway
. Europe saw a proliferation of horsecar use for new tram services from the mid-1860s, with
many towns
building new networks.
Tropical plantations (for products such as
henequen
and
bananas
) made extensive use of animal-powered trams for both passengers and freight, often employing the
Decauville
narrow-gauge
portable track system. In some cases these systems were very extensive and evolved into
interurban
tram networks (as in the
Yucatan
, which sported over 3,000 kilometers (1,900 mi) of such lines). Surviving examples may be found in both the Yucatan
[9]
and
Brazil
.
[10]
Decline
[
edit
]
Problems with horsecars included the fact that any given animal could only work so many hours on a given day, had to be housed, groomed, fed and cared for day in and day out, and produced prodigious amounts of manure,
[8]
which the streetcar company was charged with storing and then disposing. Since a typical horse pulled a streetcar for about a dozen miles (19 km) a day and worked for four or five hours, many systems needed ten or more horses in stable for each horsecar.
Horsecars were largely replaced by electric-powered
streetcars
following the invention by
Frank J. Sprague
of an overhead trolley system on streetcars for collecting electricity from
overhead wires
. His spring-loaded
trolley pole
used a wheel to travel along the wire. In late 1887 and early 1888, using his trolley system, Sprague installed the first successful large electric street railway system in
Richmond, Virginia
.
Long a transportation obstacle, the hills of Richmond included grades of over 10%, and were an excellent proving ground for acceptance of the new technology in other cities. Within a year, the economy of electric power had replaced more costly horsecars in many cities. By 1889, 110 electric railways incorporating Sprague's equipment had been begun or planned on several continents.
Many large metropolitan lines lasted well into the early twentieth century.
New York City
had a regular horsecar service on the
Bleecker Street Line
until its closure in 1917.
[11]
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
, had its Sarah Street line drawn by horses until 1923. The last regular mule-drawn cars in the US ran in
Sulphur Rock, Arkansas
, until 1926 and were commemorated by a
U.S. postage stamp
issued in 1983.
[12]
Toronto
's horse-drawn streetcar operations ended in 1891.
[13]
In other countries animal-powered tram services often continued well into the 20th century; the last mule tram service in
Mexico City
ended in 1932, and a mule tram in
Celaya, Mexico
, survived until 1954.
[14]
Operational horsecars
[
edit
]
A few original horsecar lines have survived or have been revived as tourist attractions, and in recent years several replica horsecar lines have been built. Below is a list of locations around the world with operational horsecars that are open to the public.
Location
|
Image
|
Coordinates
|
Location
|
Country
|
Track gauge
|
Year
originally
built
|
Notes
|
Ardenwood Historic Farm
|
|
37°33′42″N
122°02′32″W
/
37.561714°N 122.042165°W
/
37.561714; -122.042165
(
Ardenwood Historic Farm
)
|
Fremont
, California
|
US
|
3 ft
(
914 mm
)
|
1988
|
Diesel locomotives
also pull passengers on this line and
steam locomotives
are used during special events.
[15]
|
Dobeln Tramway
|
|
51°07′10″N
13°07′11″E
/
51.119467°N 13.119690°E
/
51.119467; 13.119690
(
Dobeln Tramway
)
|
Dobeln
, Saxony
|
Germany
|
1,000 mm
(
3 ft
3
+
3
⁄
8
in
)
metre gauge
|
1892
|
[16]
|
Douglas Bay Horse Tramway
|
|
54°10′03″N
4°27′39″W
/
54.167378°N 4.460777°W
/
54.167378; -4.460777
(
Douglas Bay Horse Tramway
)
|
Douglas
|
Isle of Man
|
3 ft
(
914 mm
)
|
1876
|
[17]
|
Ghora Tram
|
|
31°27′01″N
73°33′50″E
/
31.450257°N 73.563902°E
/
31.450257; 73.563902
(
Ghora Tram
)
|
Ghangha Pur
, Punjab
|
Pakistan
|
2 ft
(
610 mm
)
|
1898
|
[18]
|
Historical Village of Hokkaido
[
jp
]
|
|
43°02′39″N
141°29′58″E
/
43.044230°N 141.499428°E
/
43.044230; 141.499428
(
Historical Village of Hokkaido
)
|
Sapporo
, Hokkaido
|
Japan
|
2 ft 6 in
(
762 mm
)
|
1983
|
[19]
|
Horse-Drawn Streetcars (Disneyland Park (Paris))
|
|
48°52′17″N
2°46′45″E
/
48.871276°N 2.779073°E
/
48.871276; 2.779073
(
Horse-Drawn Streetcars (Disneyland Park (Paris))
)
|
Marne-la-Vallee
, Ile-de-France
|
France
|
3 ft
(
914 mm
)
|
1992
|
Located in
Disneyland Paris
.
[20]
|
Koiwai Farm
[
jp
]
|
|
39°45′14″N
141°01′13″E
/
39.753788°N 141.020163°E
/
39.753788; 141.020163
(
Koiwai Farm
)
|
Shizukuishi, Iwate
|
Japan
|
3 ft
(
914 mm
)
|
1904
|
[21]
|
Main Street Vehicles (Disneyland)
|
|
33°48′38″N
117°55′10″W
/
33.810506°N 117.919564°W
/
33.810506; -117.919564
(
Main Street Vehicles (Disneyland)
)
|
Anaheim
, California
|
US
|
3 ft
(
914 mm
)
|
1955
|
Located in the
Disneyland Resort
.
[22]
|
Main Street Vehicles (Magic Kingdom)
|
|
28°25′02″N
81°34′54″W
/
28.417105°N 81.581644°W
/
28.417105; -81.581644
(
Main Street Vehicles (Magic Kingdom)
)
|
Bay Lake, Florida
|
US
|
3 ft
(
914 mm
)
|
1971
|
Located in
Walt Disney World
.
[23]
|
Pferdeeisenbahn (Kerschbaum)
[
de
]
|
|
48°35′06″N
14°28′13″E
/
48.584936°N 14.470366°E
/
48.584936; 14.470366
(
Pferdeeisenbahn (Kerschbaum)
)
|
Rainbach im Muhlkreis
, Upper Austria
|
Austria
|
1,106 mm
(
3 ft
7
+
1
⁄
2
in
)
|
1828
|
Reconstructed portion of the
Budweis
-
Linz
-
Gmunden
Horse Railway, the first railway line in
Continental Europe
to carry passengers.
[24]
|
Spiekerooger Inselbahn
[
de
]
|
|
53°46′10″N
7°41′21″E
/
53.769413°N 7.689123°E
/
53.769413; 7.689123
(
Spiekerooger Inselbahn
)
|
Spiekeroog
, Lower Saxony
|
Germany
|
1,000 mm
(
3 ft
3
+
3
⁄
8
in
)
metre gauge
|
1885
|
[25]
|
Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram
|
|
35°33′22″S
138°37′27″E
/
35.556095°S 138.624294°E
/
-35.556095; 138.624294
(
Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram
)
|
Victor Harbor, South Australia
|
Australia
|
5 ft 3 in
(
1,600 mm
)
|
1864
|
[26]
|
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
Filey, Mike
(1986).
Not a One Horse Town
.
North York, Ontario
:
Firefly Books
. p. unpaged.
ISBN
0-9691501-1-3
.
- ^
Robert M. Stamp (1989).
Riding the Radials, Toronto's Suburban Electric Streetcar Lines
. The Boston Mills Press.
ISBN
1-55046-008-0
. Retrieved
2016-04-16
.
Chapter 1 - The Spinal Cord of Yonge Street
- ^
a
b
c
d
[1]
Archived
2013-09-27 at the
Wayback Machine
CTC website. Accessed 16 August 2013.
- ^
"Growth of Mumbai & its Municipal Corporation".
Quarterly journal of the Local Self Government Institute (Mumbai)
. 1976. p. 13.
- ^
David, M. D. (1995).
Mumbai, the city of dreams: a history of the first city in India
. Himalaya Publishing House. pp. 199?200.
- ^
Aklekar, Rajendra B (2014).
Halt station India : the dramatic tale of the nation's first rail lines
.
Rupa & Co
. p. 193.
ISBN
9788129134974
. Retrieved
23 April
2019
.
- ^
Middleton, William D.
(1967).
The Time of the Trolley
, pp. 13 and 424. Milwaukee:
Kalmbach Publishing
.
ISBN
0-89024-013-2
.
- ^
a
b
Eric Morris (Spring 2007).
"From Horse Power to Horsepower"
(PDF)
.
Access
. No. 30. Berkeley, CA: University of California Transportation Center. pp. 2?9. Archived from
the original
(PDF)
on 2014-01-24
. Retrieved
2014-02-17
.
- ^
Allen Morrison.
"The Tramways of Yucatan - Part 4"
. Retrieved
2008-12-23
.
- ^
"E.F.S. - The Decauville Section"
. Retrieved
2008-12-23
.
- ^
"New York Loses its Last Horse Car" New York Times; Friday, July 29, 1917. Page 12 (Cable Car Lines in New York and New Jersey)
- ^
"Sulphur Rock Street Car; Encyclopedia of Arkansas History & Culture"
. Retrieved
2008-12-23
.
- ^
Mike Filey
(1996).
From Horse Power to Horsepower: Toronto: 1890-1930
.
Dundurn Press
. p. 74.
ISBN
9781554881734
.
- ^
Allen Morrison.
"The Indomitable Tramways of Celaya"
. Retrieved
2008-12-22
.
- ^
"Ardenwood Historic Farm ? official website"
.
East Bay Regional Park District
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Dobeln Tramway ? official website (in German)"
. Traditionsverein "Dobelner Pferdebahn e.V.". Archived from
the original
on May 29, 2016
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Douglas Bay Horse Tramway ? official website"
. Isle of Man Heritage Railways. Archived from
the original
on December 13, 2003
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"
Ghora Tram:
Historic Horse Tram Returns to Gangapur!"
. Indian Railways Fan Club
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Historical Village of Hokkaido ? official website (in Japanese)"
. Historical Village of Hokkaido Foundation
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Horse-Drawn Streetcars (Disneyland Park (Paris)) ? official website"
.
Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Koiwai Farm ? official website"
. Koiwai Farm Ltd
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Main Street Vehicles (Disneyland) ? official website"
. Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Main Street Vehicles (Magic Kingdom) ? official website"
. Walt Disney Parks and Resorts
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Pferdeeisenbahn (Kerschbaum) ? official website (in German)"
. Verein Freunde der Pferdeeisenbahn
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Spiekeroog (in German)"
. Inselbahn.de
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
- ^
"Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram ? official website"
. Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram
. Retrieved
August 26,
2016
.
External links
[
edit
]
|
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Four-wheeled
carriages and coaches
| |
---|
Two-wheeled
carriages and carts
| |
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Non-wheeled
| |
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Wagons &
drayage
| |
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Vehicle construction
| |
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Harness
| |
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Related
| |
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Categories
| |
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‡ indicates vehicles that were used historically in public transport services
|