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Washington's lack of a versatile streetcar system has been a long-standing complaint of most D.C. transit-types; DCist itself has been no stranger to vouch in their favor. The reasoning behind the absence of trams has been huffed and puffed in so many different forums, but here's the brass tacks: streetcars normally run on overhead wires, most of D.C. doesn't allow for them, and lifting that ban would require the approval of Congress, which is just not going to happen anytime soon.
The obvious solution would be to bury the power lines, right? Well, the offerings in that capacity have been mostly lackluster -- especially considering our fair city's tendency to treat it's roads with all the tenderness of a hardcore professional wrestling match (even when there's barely any precipitation to be found).
Well, lackluster until now, that is.
Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space (with a tip of the cap to Ryan Avent) brings the news that Canadian company Bombardier has developed a new underground power source for streetcars, which would effectively solve the issue of overhead wires and eliminate the need for Congressional approval. (Ah, be still my beating heart.)
The PRIMOVE system is fairly ingenious -- it involves both the transfer and storing of energy to reduce wear on components and keep power levels constant along the track. The only hiccup with the new technology is that it only works with Bombardier's Flexity tram vehicles, and whether or not the District would be able to purchase these cars (as opposed to the arrangements with Inekon currently in place to provide vehicles for the Anacostia line) is certainly a legitimate question.
Concerns like this, though, can (and hopefully will) be addressed when the time comes -- for now, it's just nice to bask in the independence from the Federal government that this has the potential to bring to local transit.
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Can someone explain what is so great and/or desirable about streetcars? How are they not just buses with limited mobility?
When a vehicle travels on a fixed path, it increases the confidence of casual riders and visitors that the vehicle is actually going where the rider thinks it's going. Lots of people have had the experience of getting on a bus and then finding out that it's not the bus that's going where we wanted to go. Most people need to have a lot of familiarity with the bus system before they're willing to rely on it, but they'll take their chances on subways/streetcars because they know the subway/streetcar can only go where the tracks are.
not to mention what it does for the value of real estate along the route. business owners are more likely to invest in a store on a fixed route because they know it's not going to be picked up and moved anytime soon, like a bus route could be. you have a somewhat captive set of eyeballs on your storefront, now, and you're likely to see increased foot traffic (and more business).
Streetcars are also more cost-effective in the long run. Big initial construction costs, but factor that in over the life of the line (almost indefinite), you're spending less. Busses are cheaper to roll out but need far more maintenance and only have a life of 8-10 years before they need to be scrapped. Lower adminstrative costs as well, since you need fewer maintenance support contracts.
The real issues is deciding where those lines go, but in DC's case, certain corridors will always need mass transit, rail or otherwise. And with the economy stangant and wages low, now is the time to make this type of investment.
And most importantly, if implemented as they are in most places, trams/streetcars run free of traffic. So unlike buses they actually arrive on time, and you can schedule around them. And you can travel faster than the surrounding traffic making them more attractive than cars. Whereas buses aren't tempting enough to get people out of cars since they usually sit in the same traffic jams and arrive whenever the hell they can get around to it.
Oh the irony: 40-something years ago DDOT ripped up all the streetcar tracks and took out all the infrastructure to run them to make more room for cars.
The who streetcar situation makes me laugh my DC native butt off.
it wasn't the District that ripped up all the streetcar tracks - it was the privately owned bus companies that had bought all the streetcar companies.
it was during the great car era of the 50's and 60's when cars and highways were THE way to celebrate American freedom.
What is truly ironic is that the tracks shown in your photograph show the only remaining bits of the unique technology DC once developed to create the streetcar system without overhead wires mandated by Congress. We've been through this before and now we'll go through it again.