Do you know where an electric tram was first launched in Russia? I am especially pleased to tell you about this, since the first tram in Russia operating on a permanent basis was launched in Nizhny Novgorod, the city where I live. And this event recently turned 120 years old. Why exactly Nizhny Novgorod, not a capital city, became the first in the country where this new type of urban transport was launched? This, and other interesting facts related to this event, will be discussed in this article.
120 years of the Nizhny Novgorod tram - the first in Russia
Recently I was driving around the city, and a huge billboard with the inscription " 120 years of the Nizhny Novgorod tram - the first in Russia! ".
I immediately remembered how 20 years ago, my whole family with my son (he was then 4 years old), went to a holiday dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the Nizhny Novgorod tram - the first in Russia. Arriving home, I took out our old videos (fortunately, we already had a video camera on which we recorded all significant events and travels), and watched with pleasure and remembered this holiday again. What same we were then young! And now 20 years have passed ... And again a holiday! Now it is already 120 years old for the first Nizhny Novgorod tram in Russia!
The Nizhny Novgorod tram became the first city passenger tram in Russia with a permanent operating mode, and it was launched on May 8, 1896.
Earlier than this date, in 1895, an ice tram was launched in St. Petersburg as an experiment, but it could not work constantly, but only seasonally.
In 1892, the first tram went to Kyiv, but this is another state - Ukraine.
In 1894 - in Lvov, but then this city belonged to Austria and was called Lemberg.
In 1895 - in Kaliningrad, but at that time it was Prussia, and the city was called Koenigsberg.
And so it turns out that Nizhny Novgorod became the city in Russia, where the electric tram, which operates constantly, first appeared.
Why was it in Nizhny Novgorod that the first tram in Russia was launched?
The fact is that in 1896 Nizhny Novgorod was honored to host the XVI All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition, which was held from May 28 to September 30. It was for the opening of this exhibition that the first tram route was laid.
This Exhibition was an outstanding event in Russian life! It stood out even among other exhibitions in the world, surpassing them both in area, and in the number of visitors, and in the number of exhibits. So, the Nizhny Novgorod exhibition in terms of the occupied area exceeded the World Exhibition in Paris (1889), and the Moscow All-Russian Exhibition in 1882 was generally more than 3 times! And it was visited by about a million people!
Nizhny Novgorod then became the first and only of the non-capital cities of the Russian Empire, which was awarded this high honor of hosting the All-Russian Exhibition.
Why did the choice fall on Nizhny Novgorod? This is easily explained.
First of all, the Nizhny Novgorod Fair then played a huge role in the economic life of Russia, thanks to which there was even a saying: " Petersburg is the head of Russia, Moscow is its heart, and Nizhny is its pocket".
Secondly, the city has a convenient location in the center of Russia with a developed river (the city stands at the confluence of the Volga and Oka), land and rail links.
BUT, third, the location of the city is distinguished by a picturesque landscape (the city is located on both sides of the rivers: the left bank is a low-lying plain, and the right bank is the high steep slopes of the Dyatlovy Mountains, the height difference is about 140 meters).
As always, before holding such significant events, mass construction and landscaping is unfolding in the city. This happened in 1896 in Nizhny Novgorod - electric lighting was installed, an electric tram and funiculars were launched (carried passengers from the upper part of the city to the lower one), hotels, a city theater, district court buildings, an exchange were built, a huge territory was developed for the exhibition , on which 172 pavilions were erected.
In this way, thanks to the holding of the All-Russian Exhibition in our city, Nizhny Novgorod became the first city in Russia where a tram was launched.
Interestingly, Nizhny Novgorod became the only city in the country, on the streets of which first an electric tram appeared, and only then a horse tram (in 1908, the only city passenger route was launched). Usually the opposite happened.
And one more interesting fact concerning our Nizhny Novgorod tram. Again we are the first! Nizhny Novgorod is the first city in Russia where the tram rose to a height of about 100 m. This happened in 1924.
And since 1933, regular traffic was opened on a section of the mountain (Pokhvalinsky congress), where the slope reaches 9 cm per 1 m of the path (90 ppm). Until recently, among all the cities of Russia for trams, this was the maximum slope. Now there is a steeper slope of 120 ppm only in the city of Ust-Katav, Chelyabinsk region, but there this line is not used for urban passenger traffic, but is used for official purposes.
And finally, one more interesting fact.
During the Great Patriotic War, there was no direct connection between the two railway stations in our city - Moscow and Romodanovsky, and Nizhny Novgorod produced a lot of products for the front. It was necessary to somehow deliver these military cargoes from one station to another, and these are different branches of the railway. And then the railway workers adapted tram tracks for this, which were laid along the bridge across the Oka. Fortunately, the width of the tram and railway track coincided. At night, observing the blackout, a small group of railway cars passed through the dangerous area, in the head and tail of which there were locomotives.
I hope you were interested in learning some historical facts about the appearance of the first tram in Russia.
I have another big article on my site that tells about Nizhny Novgorod.
And on this I say goodbye to you, my dear readers.
● From the history of words
Compared to them, the horse wheel experienced less rolling friction, which allowed the horse to move a larger load. However, other shortcomings have not been eliminated. The working day of the horse was limited by the physical capabilities of the animal (four to five hours). On average, there were ten horses per car of a horse-drawn tram, which, moreover, required care.
In New York, the horse tram was closed in the year, at about the same time the horse trams in many other cities ceased to exist. Usually they were replaced by electric trams, although there were also curiosities: so in the year on one of the last routes horses were replaced. A horse-drawn carriage clung to the bus from behind. To avoid confusion, a sign "tram" was installed on the bus. In this form, the route existed for four years, after which the rails were removed and ordinary, “non-tram” buses began to run along the route.
Other types of trams
In addition to horse cars and electric trams that appeared later, there were other types. Small ones were sometimes used, but their distribution in cities was hindered by the smoke and noise they produced.
The advent of electric trams
Russian scientists and inventors, V.N. Chikalev, D.A. Lochinov, and back in the year developed the main theoretical issues related to the activities of electric transport. And the first inventor-practitioner is the Russian scientist Fedor Apollonovich Pirotsky. Back in the year, on the section of the railway between and he tested the principle of transmitting electricity along the rails. In the year, experiments were carried out that were necessary to start the widespread use of electric propulsion in urban transport. Thanks to the work of Pirotsky, a motor tram car was moved along the rails of horse-drawn railways by electric force for the first time in the world.
In Europe
The prototype of electric trams (as well as) was a machine created by a German engineer. It was first used in the year at the German Industrial Exhibition in . used to ride visitors around the exhibition area. The speed was 6.5 km / h, the locomotive was powered by a third rail with a voltage of 150 volts and had a power of 3 hp. The mass of the locomotive was a quarter of a ton. Four clung to the locomotive, each of which had six seats. For four months, 86,000 visitors of the exhibition used the services of the new vehicle. Later, the train was demonstrated in the year in and , in the year in (in a non-working state), in the same year in action in and finally in the year in (in the crystal palace) and in . , along which this semi-toy train ran, was 508 millimeters.
Following the success with the exhibition attraction, Siemens set about building a 2.5 km electric tram line in the Berlin suburb of Lichterfeld. The motor car received a current of 100 volts through both rails. The motor power of the tram was 5 kilowatts. The maximum speed was 20 km / h. In the year the first tram, built by the company, passed along the railway between and Lichterfeld, thereby opening tram traffic.
In the same year, Siemens built a tram line of the same type in Paris.
IN THE USA
The appearance of the first trams occurred independently of Europe. Inventor Leo Daft began experimenting with electric propulsion in 1999 by building several small electric locomotives (see). His work interested the director of the Baltimore horse-drawn carriage, who decided to convert the three-mile line to an electric basis. Daft took up the electrification of the line and the creation of trams. 2009, this line opened the movement of an electric tram - the first on the American continent. However, the system turned out to be inoperative: the use of the third rail led to short circuits during, besides, the voltage (120 volts) killed many unlucky small animals (and), and it was not safe for people either. Soon, the use of electricity on this line was abandoned and returned to the horses.
However, the inventor did not abandon the idea of an electric tram, and in a year he managed to create a workable system (instead of the third rail, a two-wire contact network was used). Trams of the Daft system were used in, New York and.
Another American streetcar pioneer was Charles Van Depoele. Having learned about the success of the Siemens electric locomotive in Germany, he arranged a demonstration of his own experimental electric car in 1883 at an industrial exhibition in. His experiments aroused interest, and by 1886 five US cities (including Scranton) and one city (Windsor) were running streetcars of his system. For power, he used a single-wire contact network. A direct current of 1400 volts was used.
However, the real development of trams in the United States began after engineer Frank J. Sprague created a reliable current collector - a trolley rod. The trolley current collector was not only reliable, but also safe compared to the third rail. In 1888, a streetcar network created by Sprague opened in Richmond, Virginia. Very soon, the same systems appeared in many other cities in the United States.
In Europe, they also quickly abandoned the power supply of the tram through the third rail, as well as the power supply from two conventional rails (this system had all the disadvantages of the third rail, plus it complicated the design of the tram, as it required isolation of the wheel sets, otherwise the wheels and the axle connecting them caused a short closure between rails). However, instead of a trolley rod, Siemens developed a yoke current collector (looks like an arc).
The golden age of trams
The period of the most rapid spread of the tram lasted from the beginning of the 20th century until. In many cities, new tram systems were created, and existing ones were constantly expanded: the tram actually became the main type of urban transport. Horse-drawn vehicles had practically disappeared from the streets of European and American cities by 1910, buses were still in their early development, and cars had not yet had time to turn from luxury into a means of transportation.
By the end of the 20s, it became clear that the period of tram domination was coming to an end. Worried about falling revenues, the presidents of the US streetcar companies held a conference in 1929, at which it was decided to develop a series of unified, significantly improved cars, which received the name. These cars, which first saw the light in 1934, set a new bar in the technical equipment, convenience and appearance of the tram, influencing the entire history of the development of the tram for many years to come.
Temporary disappearance from many cities
In many countries, the growth in popularity led to the rapid disappearance of trams from city streets (around the end of the fifties). Trams had to compete not only with cars purchased in personal possession, but also with. First of all, this process affected the countries of North America and Western Europe, but it was also observed in South America and in Asian countries.
Governments have primarily invested in road transport, as the car was generally seen as a symbol of progress. For example, the President of France said in 1971: "The city must accept the car."
Technological progress has increased reliability, which have become a serious competitor to the tram - including due to the fact that they did not require expensive infrastructure. Often, buses also provided a more comfortable ride and smoother ride than the old tram cars. In some places the tram changed.
Tram networks were not modernized, and therefore their condition was constantly deteriorating, and, accordingly, the public's opinion about trams as a form of transport worsened.
Trams almost completely disappeared in, (trams survived only in, Saint-Etienne and), Great Britain (out of fifteen cities only retained its tram), and (with the exception of and). At the same time, they were preserved and modernized in other countries. In some countries, the situation with respect to the tram was different in different cities. So, in Finland the tram was closed, but the tram was preserved and even developed. In Sweden, Norrköpping's trams have been preserved and, but when switching from left-hand to right-hand traffic, the tram network in the center was completely closed.
A somewhat different evolution was observed in the countries of the socialist bloc. Motorization was proclaimed as one of the important goals of socialist development, but in reality its pace was very low. Therefore, public transport, including the tram, played a vital role in the life of society. However, starting from the thirties in the USSR, and later in other socialist countries, a trolleybus began to be considered as a competitor to the tram. The pace of tram development slowed down, in some places tram lines were replaced by trolleybus lines. Many tram facilities suffered damage during; some of them were not restored and the losses were compensated by bus and trolleybus.
The revival of trams
A negative consequence of mass motorization, especially in large cities, was such problems as traffic congestion, noise, lack of parking space, etc. This led to a gradual revision of transport policy.
At the same time, neither buses nor subways were able to solve the problems that arose. Buses could not provide a sufficiently high passenger flow due to insufficient capacity, moreover, when used in cities, buses stood in traffic jams along with cars, which did not contribute to their efficiency. The construction of the metro requires large capital investments, and the operation is also very expensive. Thus, the scope of the metro is limited only to very large cities. In many cities, the construction of a subway system is impossible (or prohibitively expensive) for geological reasons or because of the presence of monuments.
Against this background, the advantages of the tram became more noticeable. The revival of the tram began in the late seventies. One of the first new tram systems were opened in, in the cities (in) and (in). On the European continent, the revival of trams began in , where new tram systems opened in and in . It is interesting that it was France half a century before, back in the thirties, that began to get rid of the tram as an “obsolete mode of transport”, for example, the first tram ceased to exist in the year (now the Parisian tram has been revived).
present tense
In Europe
The last ten years have become the era of a real tram boom. For example, in the UK, where at the end of the 1980s there were trams in only one city (), now tram traffic is open in five cities:, and Croydon (suburb). Plans to revive tram service are being considered in Liverpool, and (in the city centre). Trams have taken to the streets again, and trams are being built in other cities and in four more cities.
Also, new tram systems were opened in ( , 2004, before that there were no trams in Ireland), ( ), ( , ) and other countries. However, at the same time, a new tram competitor appeared in France - the so-called ( Tramway sur pneus) - something like a hybrid of a tram and. Now "trams on tires" are used in (opened in 2000) and Caen (2002).
In addition, there is the concept LRT ( Light Rail Transit, LRT). Light rail transport refers to railroad primarily off-street passenger systems built to lightweight standards and using more economical engineering solutions compared to railroad and "classic" metro. LRT is distinguished from the tram by a higher degree of isolation, and from the metro by the use of lighter rolling stock and lower construction costs due to the minimization of expensive underground work. The boundaries between LRT and trams, as well as between LRT and classical metro or railway, are blurred due to the wide variety of types of rail transport systems.
In many cities in Germany (for example, in,) and France, the metro system (in Germany U-Bahn) is widespread, which has a small number of underground stations in the city center, and a significant number of outdoor stations directly on city streets, where trains differ little from trams. However, these cities also have an independent pure tram network. The difference between trams and metros is that trams have fewer cars connected and are more maneuverable on the streets, metros have larger cars, and street-facing metro lines are somewhat better protected from pedestrians and other traffic.
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In North America
A slightly different trend is observed in North America. Here, too, new systems are being created, which can be divided into two categories: light rail and historic tram heritage street car.
In other parts of the world
Trams are not as popular in Central and South America. Here, trams compete with high-speed bus and trolleybus systems ( BRT, Bus Rapid Transit).
In Asia, the tram appeared at the very end. The first city in East Asia to acquire this means of transport was in the year. In the year the tram appeared in, a few years later - in and.
The tram reached its maximum development in Asia at the end of the years. Over the years, with the growth of road traffic, as well as under the influence of the then urban fashion, trams disappear from the streets of most large and medium-sized cities in the region.
However, tram systems continue to operate in many Asian cities. Quite old double-decker trams, which are both a means of transport and a tourist attraction, operate and are very popular. In the beginning of the production of its own low-floor cars. In, on and in other Asian countries, new tram systems have been put into operation on a modern technical basis.
History of trams in Russia
The emergence and pre-revolutionary development of electric trams
The first tram in the Russian Empire was put into operation a year ago, it was built by an engineer. Then he appeared in, ... In the capital cities -, - he had to endure the struggle with competitors - (in Kyiv there was practically no such struggle due to the difficult terrain - the horses could not cope with steep climbs).
The oldest tram in modern Russia is located at. During the opening of the electric tram in 1895 (the horse tram had existed since 1881), this city was called Königsberg and belonged to Germany.
Owners of horse-drawn carriages, private and joint-stock companies, who at one time received the rights to build "horse-drawn railways", for a long time did not want to return these rights back. The law of the Russian Empire was on their side, and the issued rights stated that the city government could not use any other type of transport on the streets for fifty years without the consent of the "horse" owners.
In Moscow, the tram went only a year, and in St. Petersburg - only a year, despite the fact that the first tram line was laid there back in 1894 right on the ice.
"Ice" trams ran on several routes: Senatskaya Square - Vasilyevsky Island, Mytishchi Square - Petrogradskaya Side, Field of Mars - Vyborgskaya Side. The rails and sleepers were simply laid on the ice surface, and the wire poles were frozen into the ice. Ice trams began operating in the winter of 1904-05. Their appearance was due to the fact that the horse-drawn carriages were actually monopolists: under the terms of the contracts, horse-drawn railway companies had a lease of land on all central streets. However, trams were allowed to run on the ice of the Neva even after the trams lost their monopoly on public transport. At least a photograph of such a tram, dated 1914, has been preserved.
Before the revolution, a unique suburban line appeared in St. Petersburg to Strelna, Peterhof and Oranienbaum, which in 1929 was included in the city network.
Period of revolution and destruction
Tram restoration
Since 1921, the period of restoration of tram traffic in the cities of the RSFSR began. The practice of free travel on the tram, introduced during the period, was abolished, which helped to improve working conditions on the tram, re-engage specialists and leaders, and repair many previously abandoned cars. In 1922, for the first time after a long break, new sections were opened for traffic in Moscow.
The importance of the tram for the new authorities is evidenced by the phrase said by the “all-Union headman”: “If a tram works in a city, then Soviet power operates in the city.” The tram networks of Moscow and Petrograd were restored and developed rapidly. At that time, tram lines were opened in cities that had not previously had a tram. In the "Twelve Chairs" by Ilf and Petrov, the construction of a tram in Stargorod is ironically described, the prototype of which was probably the construction in Bogorodsk (now).
Course towards standardization and unification
The development of the tram in the pre-war period
Tram development in the post-war period
Immediately after the end of the Great Patriotic War, the tram economy faced a serious problem of restoring the destroyed infrastructure. And although most of the tracks and rolling stock were quickly restored and put into operation, on some routes where restoration was too laborious or impractical, the tram was replaced by trolleybuses and buses. Thus, one of the few intercity tram lines ceased to exist - where a bus was introduced instead of a tram.
While in metropolitan areas the tram was partially replaced by the metro, in cities with a population of less than a million people, the tram continued to develop dynamically.
USSR Russia Ulyanovsk).
In recent years, the tram has been treated as something outdated. At the same time, few people think about the fact that until recently this type of transport seemed so unusual that they were afraid of it, they looked at it as something new and ultramodern. In the very origin of this transport, indeed, there are many very unusual things. By a strange coincidence, the very first trams appeared almost simultaneously in Russia (F.A. Pirotsky), Germany (V. von Siemens) and the USA (L. Daft).
The forerunner of the electric tram was the horsecar - a wagon that was pulled along the rails by horses (sometimes zebras and mules). The first tram went to Baltimore in 1828.
There were also trams on traction, driven by a rope. In San Francisco in 1880 they made a cable car, which still exists today. They tried to replace horse traction with steam. In Russia, at the end of the 1880s, similar cars appeared in St. Petersburg, but they did not take root because of the very strong noise - the “smoke-fire” steam engine (four horse-drawn wagons) could not drive through the narrow streets for a long time. In the then Russian capital, since 1885, "ice" trams began to run along the winter Neva.
The first electric tram in St. Petersburg went only in 1899. While in Europe, with the active participation of Werner von Siemens, trams went already in 1881, in the USA, in 1888, Spraig created an entire tram network. Even in Russian Kyiv, due to the fact that it was difficult to ride horsecars there, they decided to launch the first tram earlier than in Moscow and St. Petersburg, in 1892.
But it was with St. Petersburg that the first experiments of the engineer Fyodor Pirotsky were connected, who, based on the research of B.S. Jacobi and the electric motor he invented, in August 1880 presented the audience with a two-tier horse-drawn tram No. 114, which moved independently with the help of an electric motor. But surprisingly, in St. Petersburg it was considered that a lot of money would be spent on electricity, and, according to the government, it would not be possible to make a profit from this invention, so horse racing ran in many cities even before the 20s of the 20th century.
The first tram line in St. Petersburg was opened only in 1907. Therefore, in history, Werner von Siemens is considered the first inventor of the tram, who presented at the Berlin Exhibition in 1879 a new miracle machine - an electric tram, which gained speed unprecedented at that time - 7 km per hour.
Julia Misyura, Samogo.Net
How and where did this type of urban transport appear
The tram is the most poetic and romantic form of transport, it is mentioned in hundreds of songs, books, poems. May 21 marks the anniversary of the launch of the very first tram in our country, so it's time for us to talk about it.
The progenitor of the tram was the so-called "horse" - the city railway, along which horse-drawn wagons moved. They appeared in the USA in the first half of the 19th century, spread to all developed countries of the world and existed until the beginning of the 20th century, when horse-drawn trams were replaced by electric ones. In Mexico, horsecars worked until 1956, and on the British Isle of Man they can still be seen today, however, not as a regular transport, but as a tool to attract tourists.
In addition to horse cars, before the invention of trams, there were other types of urban rail transport: steam, cable, pneumatic, gasoline, etc. But the real heyday of the era of trams came only after they began to work on electricity. The theoretical basis for the functioning of electric transport V. N. Chikalev, B. S. Yakobi, D. A. Lochinov and P. N. Yablochkov was created back in 1838, but in practice it was implemented only four decades later. Since 1876, the Russian scientist Fyodor Apollonovich Pirotsky has been testing the movement of cars on electric traction and even managed to “move” the train along the rails in 1880, but did not complete his experiment. Therefore, Werner von Siemens from Germany, who patented it, is considered the actual inventor of the tram. The first tram passed along the railway line between Berlin and Lichterfeld in 1881, at the same time the first tram line appeared in Paris.
The first tram in the Russian Empire was launched in 1892 in Kyiv. Siemens machine. Then tram lines appeared in Nizhny Novgorod, Yekaterinburg, Vitebsk, Kursk, Moscow, Kazan, Tver. In 1907, the tram appeared in the capital - St. Petersburg.
Until the Second World War, the tram was the main form of public transport in all developed cities of the world. Existing tram lines were constantly expanded, new routes were opened. But gradually the tram began to be forced out of the city streets by other modes of transport.
Trams went to the periphery of urban transport in the late 1950s. Cars by this time had ceased to be a luxury, technological progress has significantly increased the reliability and efficiency of trolleybuses and buses. For the latter, it was not necessary to lay rails and build complex depots, so they were increasingly produced on city streets instead of trams. In some countries, such as France or the UK, trams have disappeared almost completely.
In the USSR, and then in Russia, trams, even at the time of the decline of their popularity, remained extremely in demand. In the socialist countries, the population did not acquire personal cars as quickly as in the West, so public transport flourished.
Today, trams are back in fashion. The world community has long been concerned about the problem of environmental pollution, and trams, like trolleybuses, are environmentally friendly vehicles that do not emit harmful emissions into the atmosphere, like cars or buses. Therefore, many countries where trams remained in one or two cities are now planning to resume active tram traffic.
Interesting facts about trams
The most "tram" city is St. Petersburg. The length of tram tracks in the Northern capital is 220 kilometers, which was recorded in the Guinness Book of Records. Melbourne can also be called the "capital of trams", as it has the largest network of this type of transport.
The longest tram route is the Coast Tram in Belgium. Its length is 67 kilometers. On which trams make 60 stops. There is also a 185 km line from Freudenstadt to Öhringen.
In the summer of 1872, the Polytechnic Exhibition was held in Moscow, dedicated to the 200th anniversary of the birth of Peter the Great. Especially for the exhibition, the Ministry of War laid the first temporary horse-drawn tram line along the central streets of the city - from the Iversky Gates to the current Belorussky railway station. The movement of wagons was opened on June 25 (July 7), 1872. The movement along the first rebuilt Petrovsky horse tram line (from the Iverskaya Chapel through Strastnaya Square, Tverskaya Zastava to Petrovsky Park) was opened on September 1 (13), 1874. In subsequent years, the network of horse-drawn railways grew steadily. In November 1891, all previously existing horse tram routes were revised and 25 new lines began to operate.
In July 1898, the First Society of Horse-Railways, with the consent of the city government, began the electrification of the first three sections of its network. The company has begun re-equipment of the Dolgorukovskaya line of the horse-drawn railway from Strastnaya Square along the street. M. Dmitrovka and further to Butyrskaya Zastava (i.e. from Pushkin Square, along Chekhov, Dolgorukovskaya, Novoslobodskaya St., along Suschevsky Val), as well as two experimental suburban lines: Petrovskaya (from Tverskaya Zastava to Petrovsky Palace) and Butyrskaya (from Butyrskaya Zastava along Upper and Lower Maslovka to Petrovsky Park). Along with the reconstruction and construction of lines, the First Society decided to build a traction substation near Butyrskaya Zastava, which was supposed to feed these three lines with electricity. And in June, the construction of the "Electric" tram depot began on Bashilovka.
The rails on the Dolgorukovskaya and Petrovskaya lines were laid grooved on wooden sleepers. The track was adopted by the railway - 5 feet - 1524 mm. Vignol type rails were laid on the Butyrskaya line.
Twenty-three motor electric and one wagon with mixed battery-electric traction were manufactured during 1898 at the Fankelried plant in Hamburg, and the electrical equipment for them came from the factories of Siemens and Halske. The cars were two-axle, 8.41 m long and 2.45 m wide. The car interior had two longitudinal benches with 20 seats in summer and 18 in winter. The front and rear platforms housed electrical equipment for controlling the car, as well as standing places. The maximum speed of movement was provided for 25 miles per hour (27 km / h).
All major construction work on the first section from Petrovsky Park along Upper and Lower Maslovka to Butyrskaya Zastava was completed by the end of January 1899. Therefore, in February, a trial running of the electric tram line and training of operating personnel began.
The grand opening of the tram movement along the first line in Moscow from Butyrskaya Zastava along the Lower and Upper Maslovka to Petrovsky Park took place on March 25 (April 6), 1899 in the Electric Park. At 4 p.m., a prayer service was performed with water blessing in front of the revered icon of the Savior Not Made by Hands and local shrines. The prayer took place in the machine building, decorated with flags. It was attended by the Moscow Governor Chamberlain A. G. Bulygin, the Moscow Postal Director Privy Councilor K. G. Radchenko, the Moscow Mayor Prince V. M. Golitsyn, the acting Moscow Police Chief Colonel D. F. Trepov, the head of the postal telegraph district F. A. von Pistolkers, government inspector P. D. Vonlyarovsky, and others.
Soon the first wagon with commanding and honorary persons set off, at the exit from the gates of the park the tricolor ribbon was cut. Behind this car, at short intervals, another 4 cars moved, filled with guests invited to the celebration.
2 Petrovsky park
Electric cars were heading to Petrovsky Park. People stood all along the way, looking with curiosity at the movement of the electric tram. In Petrovsky Park, the arrival of the tram was expected by the local population.
From Petrovsky Park, the guests were very quickly taken along the second path to Butyrskaya Zastava. Here they were waiting for the carriages of the horse-drawn railway, in which all the invitees were transferred to go to the Moskovskaya Hotel, where dinner was prepared for the invited persons.
Regular tram traffic along the suburban line from Butyrskaya Zastava to Petrovsky Park opened the next day on March 26 (April 7), 1899. The cars ran at intervals of 14 minutes from 8 am to 8 pm. A ticket for the entire line cost 6 kopecks.
All construction and installation work on the Dolgorukovskaya Line and the out-of-town section of the Petrovsky Line (Belorussky Station - Petrovsky Palace) were completed in June-July 1899. The grand opening of the electric tram movement on these lines took place on July 27 of the same year.
