Horsecar

A horse racing track, horse railway, horse-drawn trams, horse-drawn, horse-drawn tram or Swiss German Rösslitram is a program running on rails of transport used in the rare horses or mules as draft animals. Horse-drawn trams, the technical precursor of today's trains and trams, which are moved today exclusively by locomotives or railcars.

Railway

The first railways on iron-shod wooden planks were operated with working horses as draft animals. Of volume, this was usually short pit lanes. But there were also longer distances, so for example, was the horse-drawn railway Budweis -Linz - Gmunden, on the horses pulled carriages and sidecars, 128 kilometers long. In the Ruhr area existed before the opening of the first steam-powered locomotives railroads around 1835 to 1838 a horse-drawn railway network of about 50 kilometers in total length.

The following railway lines were completely or partially operated as a major horse track:

• Little Eaton gangway or Derby Canal Railway, 1792-1908, freight rail is six kilometers long on grooved rails in Little Eaton in Derbyshire
• Horse Railway Budweis -Linz - Gmunden 1827, old trade route Goldener Steig, first long-distance railway on the European continent, largely realigned when converting to steam operation
• Railway Route Saint -Étienne- Andrézieux, 1827-1844 as horse railroad, locomotive operation since
• Schlebusch Harkorter - carbon path between Silschede and hasp, 1829
• Railway Route Saint -Etienne -Lyon, passenger 1829-1844 as horse railroad, freight trains from the beginning some with steam operation
• Horse tram Prague Lana, 1830
• Wuppertal- Vohwinkel - Essen- Ruhr as Prince William Railway 1831
• Bavarian Ludwig Railway was on 19 February 1834 Royal Bavarian concession to build a railway from Nuremberg and Fürth, first horse-drawn tram operation in Germany in 1835 with a steam locomotive ( Eagle) supplemented
• The horse tram Hennef - Ruppichteroth 1860-1863
• Cottbus- Schwieloch Railroad 1846-1879 - about 31 kilometers long, could not be retrofitted
• Horse tram Warstade between the Portland cement factory in Warstade - today part of Hemmoor - and the industrial port black huts on the River Oste 1900
• Thüringerwaldbahn - in 1880 the construction of a horse-drawn railway was considered a section at Walter Hausen was also built to 1900
• Horse tram Derendingen - Biberist - Gerlafingen 1864-1875
• South Australia Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram 1896-1956 and 1986 to present

The routes were either short time later converted to normal railway lines using steam locomotives or decommissioned.

Tram

In the area of ​​trams, the drive with horses lasted longer. Most of the German and foreign companies tram started until the mid- 1880s its operation with horses. In Germany, there were over 90 horses trams, over 1700 worldwide.

Europe

• The first long-distance route in Europe was the horse-drawn railway Budweis -Linz - Gmunden Bohemia / Austria, 1827-1836 sections opened. Already 1855/56 it was converted to steam operation, set in 1872.
• Europe's first horse-drawn tram was the interurban tram Montbrison- Montrond. Taken into operation in 1839, it was reinstated in 1848 after the second bankruptcy.
• Of greater durability was also initially operated as a horse tram tram second of the Old World in France, the first Parisian tram network, 1855-1938.
• The first horse-drawn trams were operated in England, Birkenhead (29 August 1860) and London ( 1861).
• On 22 June 1865, the Berliner horse-drawn railway took the first horse-drawn tram Germany, between the Brandenburg Gate and Charlottenburg in operation.
• Austria's first horse-drawn tram reversed from 4 October 1865 by Viennese Schottentor Hernals, which was a major suburb of the capital at that time. Already from 1840 to 1842 was for a short time a tram in the area of the Augarten go.
• In Romania Timişoara, which at that time belonged to the Kingdom of Hungary, 1869 was the local horse track in operation.
• The Douglas Bay Horse Tramway in the capital of the Isle of Man is still in operation and is one of the attractions of the island.
• In Switzerland, the first Rösslitram from the June 19, 1862 in Geneva wrong.

Most initially operated with horses trams were converted before the First World War to electrical operation. The tram Hagen was set as the last horse-drawn railway in Germany on the mainland in 1930. Many former horse tram cars were further used as a sidecar for the electric tram. By 1949, still wrong on the island Spiekeroog the Spiekerooger Inselbahn with horse traction.

Asia

• The first horse-drawn tram of Asia in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, was about four miles long, was opened in 1871 and probably operated until the mid 20th century.
• The second horse-drawn tram in Asia ran from February 24, 1873 in Calcutta between Sealdah and Armenian Ghat ( Armenian Kai ) on Bowbazar and Dalhousie Square (now BBD Bag). Today it is the only city in India with a - long motor driven here - tram. In the city center is a replica of the first horse -driven tram.

Africa

America

• The world's first horse -driven tram was on 26 November 1832 in the United States in New York.
• On March 26, 1856 of horse-drawn tram began operation in Boston. Since today is a tram network there, the Green Line, with its four branches, Boston has the oldest continuously operated tram network in the world.
• Is the second oldest ( at today only eight kilometers tramway) on the January 30, 1859 also opened with horse traction in Rio de Janeiro.
• The first horse-drawn tram in Latin America went to Cuba already on 3 February 1858 in Havana in operation,
• The first horse-drawn tram in South America was opened in Chile in Santiago de Chile on 10 June 1858.

Australia

Also opened in 1861 in Sydney Australia's first tram was a horse-drawn tram. The Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram is a broad-gauge horse tram from Victor Harbor to Granite Iceland in the Encounter Bay near Adelaide in South Australia, originally from 1894 to 1956 has been in operation since 1986 and continues with two-story replicas again for tourists.

Feldbahn

An operation with horses was in use on railways, for example, to agricultural purposes were light railways. In agricultural use, it was assumed that two horses could draw on approximately flat rail routes with occasional low hills a car with eight tonnes of payload and on slopes up to five percent after all, even with a payload of three tons. This was but one and a half to two times as much as the same team was able to afford on paved road. Compared to train an agricultural vehicle on unpaved roads they even went out of the three to four times the power.

Today's horse tracks

• The Douglas Bay Horse Tramway in Douglas on the Isle of Man met since 1876 to the present day their services. More than 40 cold-blooded animals are in the urban stables to transport from early May to late September passengers on the 2.8 km long double-track tram route along the lake front of Douglas.
• The Spiekerooger Island Railway is a museum operated since the task of the regular operation in 1981 during the summer half of the year as a horse track.
• Another museum train with horse operation is the re-opened on 9 June 2007 Döbelner tram in Saxony.
• In Kerschbaum, community Rainbach in Mühlkreisautobahn, District Freistadt in Upper Austria about 500 meters of the original track were reconstructed.
• The Victor Harbor Horse Drawn Tram travels as a tourist railway since 1986 all year daily from Victor Harbor to Granite Iceland in the Encounter Bay near Adelaide in South Australia.
• In the Disneyland amusement park in Anaheim (USA) and at Disneyland in Paris run each horse tracks on the " Main Street " between the main entrance and the central place from which you enter the single experience areas.
• Inside the Park Historic Village of Hokkaido in Sapporo (Japan ) operates on weekends in the summer, a horse-drawn tram on the main road. In winter sleigh ride instead.
• A historical horse - box train runs in Fremont (USA) in Ardenwood Historic Park.

Traction

A horse of 700 kg mass has approximately 7000 Newtons own weight and can be about 20 percent of it, so make 1400 1400 N tensile force.

The example of the new Döbelner Pferdebahn arises in an unoccupied car, of 2040 kg mass, a draw resistance ( rolling resistance " iron on iron " ) (in addition results in approximately 1650 kg total of about 3700 kg mass ) of only 600 N. With 22 passengers occupied is the resistance to draw on level ground about 800 N. Thus, a one-horse operation is possible without that animal welfare is neglected. With the traction reserve of 600 N, the horse and the front car to move even up to 13 per thousand slope uphill. Two horses then the team has total mass 5100 kg 2000 N tensile force extend beyond the need for rollers for 39 per thousand upward travel.

Trivia

• In the movie The Last Sniper ( 1976) by Don Siegel with John Wayne, Lauren Bacall and James Stewart, the horse-drawn tram of Carson City is set more than once prominent in the scene.
• Many horse trams had - except the end stations - no fixed stops, even in the world's first facility in New York that was the case. The passengers could at any time request on call from inside the car or by waving from the roadside stopping. Even the jumping on and off while driving was often allowed. Then eventually led Ever since the introduction of the faster moving electric street railway companies all the known solid intermediate stops one, albeit partially to this day as required maintenance. From the tram opened in 1881 Nuremberg is narrated that there fixed points have been set up as stops before the 1896 electrification made ​​to protect the horses. The tram Erfurt led the firm hold even in 1883 after only one year nearly half a horse-drawn tram operation, or at the tram opened in 1865 Vienna it took four years. In the tram Hamburg in turn led the first one from 1880 active third horse railway companies, the SEG, fixed stops. In contrast, the two older predecessors and PEG HAS knew no fixed stops.