Brest tram

Brest tram
Stop at Château / Kastell
Basic information
Country	France
city	Brest
opening	June 23, 2012
operator	Keolis Brest
Infrastructure
Route length	14.3 km
Gauge	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Power system	750 V DC overhead line
Stops	28
business
Lines	1
Clock in the peak hours	7.5 min
Cruising speed	20 km / h
vehicles	20 Alstom Citadis 302
Top speed	70 km / h
statistics
Passengers	45,000 per day (forecast)

The Brest tram ( French Tramway de Brest ) is a tram system that went into operation on June 23, 2012 in the second largest city in Brittany . It is the successor to a tram network that operated in Brest from 1898 to 1944 .

history

Former Brest tram (nickname: the yellow danger) on the Pont National, before 1905.

Former Brest tram, around 1907

In 1898 the first two lines of the Brest tram opened. The network was in operation until the city was bombed in 1944. From 1947 trolleybuses then ran in the city. These ran on three lines, for which 30 vehicles were available. From 1963, diesel- powered buses were purchased to modernize the vehicle fleet. From 1965, one-man operation was introduced on the buses, while the trolleybuses still had to be manned by two drivers. For reasons of personnel savings, the trolleybus operation was therefore stopped on November 9, 1970.

In 1984, Georges Lombard came up with the idea of building a new tram in Brest . In a consultative referendum in 1990, however, the construction of a new tram was rejected. It was not until François Cuillandre , who has been Mayor of Brest since 2001, that the tram was included in his election manifesto.

The first new route

Line A

		Porte de Plouzané
		Fort Montbarey
		Keranroux
		Coat tan
		Vali-Hir
		Polygons
		Dupuy de Lôme
		Les Capucins
		Saint-Exupery
		Mac Orlan
		Recouvrance
		Penfeld (lifting bridge)
		Château / Kastell cable car planned to Les Capucins
		Siam
		Liberté / Frankiz line B planned
		Jean Jaurès
		Saint Martin
		Octroi
		Pilier Rouge / Pilier Ruz
		Place de Strasbourg
		Menez Paul
		Europe / Europe
		Pontanezes

		Eau Blanche
		Kerlaurent
		Porte de Guipavas
		Mesmerria
		Kergaradec / Kergaradeg
		Porte de Gouesnou

Stop sign

Renovation of the Rue de Siam in June 2011.

Turf track near the Pontanézen stop.

Alstom Citadis 302 in trial operation in 2011.

Tram leaves the Pont de Recouvrance lift bridge .

The construction of the current line A was decided in 2004 by the MPs of the Brest agglomeration. The construction costs were estimated at 300 million euros, the commissioning should take place on June 23, 2012. The track construction began in March 2010. A special feature of the Brest tram network is that the information is trilingual in French, English and Breton . This includes announcements, destination displays, stop names and timetables.

Property developer

The tram is being built by SemTram on behalf of and on behalf of the Brest Métropole Océane municipal association . It is a consortium of the companies SEM du TCSP ( SEM du transport en commun en site propre de la communauté urbaine de Brest ) and Egis Rail. The SEM du TCSP is a mixed economy company with a capital of 150,000 €, founded in April 2006 according to the decision of December 16, 2005. Its task is to ensure the project management of the construction works for the first line of the Brest tram. It comprises the following seven partners:

Brest municipal association
Finistère department
Brest Chamber of Commerce and Industry
Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations
Crédit Agricole Finistère
Credit Mutuel
Savings Bank of Brittany.

financing

The costs of the project amount to 290 million euros (as of 2006), which are broken down as follows:

Engineering services and project management: 53 million euros
Construction of the depot: 19 million euros
Purchase of the rolling stock: 63 million euros
Engineering structures: 7 million euros
Track construction and equipment: 156 million euros

Financing is provided by the municipal transport tax ( versement transport ), loans, grants from the state and the region, income from the transport company and advertising.

Route

The route runs along an axis from southwest to northeast. Starting from the Route du Conquet in the southwest, it opens up the Saint-Pierre-Quilbignon and Recouvrance districts and then crosses the Pont de Recouvrance lift bridge (which has been extensively renovated). In the district of Recouvrance, the route runs with a gradient of 8.59% on Rue Saint Exupéry , this is the largest gradient that is traveled in a French tram network. After the lift bridge, it follows the Rue de Siam to the Place de la Liberté, from where it follows the Rue Jean-Jaurès up to the Place de Strasbourg . The route branches off here: one branch runs to the Kergaradec industrial park , the other to Froutven .

Stops

The line serves 28 stops over a distance of 14.3 kilometers, which corresponds to an average distance between stops of 500 meters.

The final stop names were announced a year before the tram opened on June 22, 2011, with the exception of the Polygon stop.

Rolling stock

On May 29, 2008, a jury selected the design of the future tram cars from 123 people. The cars are painted anise green, the interior is designed in raspberry red and blue. The outer design is reminiscent of the shape of a wave, with large glass surfaces.

After Brest had left the design of its trains to Dijon , where a tram network went into operation in autumn 2012 , Brest and Dijon signed an agreement on November 27, 2008 to jointly procure the rolling stock for an order for 53 trains instead of just 20 trains to be able to advertise solely for Brest.

On September 15, 2009, the municipal associations of the greater Brest and Dijon areas announced that Alstom had won the tender for the delivery of the trams (20 for Brest, 33 for Dijon) at a total price of 106 495 483 euros. (42.6 million euros for Brest and 63.8 million euros for Dijon) This is a saving of 24% compared to the original approaches and almost 30% compared to recently signed contracts, such as in Marseille , said MEPs from both Local associations known.

The planned second route

The local authority Brest Métropole Océane announced in February 2010 that studies for the construction of a second line had already started. Mayor François Cuillandre also added: "We are convinced that the second route will be requested as soon as the first is operational."

Route

The route could run for 8 kilometers from northwest to south and connect Cavale Blanche Hospital to the port. The route would correspond to the former bus route 2. This tram route could be extended as a tram-train to Relecq-Kerhuon or even to Landerneau or Morlaix if an agreement can be found with the General Council of the Finistère department.

During the construction of the first line in 2011, various preliminary work was carried out in order to enable the construction of the second line without serious disruption to operations on the first: For example, at Place de la Liberté you will find a right-angled track crossing to Boulevard Clemenceau and a switch for one future connection of both routes.

However, there are greater problems than with the construction of the first stretch (in particular the reconstruction of Place Albert I and its tunnel), and the crossing of the Robert Schuman Bridge and the Villeneuve Bridge, if the route continues to Cavale Blanche Hospital.

A possible alternative for the second line would be a joint section from the port to Place Albert I, from where a branch would run via the university campus, Bellevue, the commercial school to the Cavale Blanche hospital along the current bus line 5. The second branch would run along Rue Paul Doumer, Boulevard Léon Blum and then open up the Kerichen, Lambézellec and Loscoat districts.

Stops

Although the names and locations of the stops have not yet been determined, the second line could serve most of the stops on the current bus line 2 between the train station and Bellevue.

It could include the following stops: Cavale Blanche Hospital, Commercial School, Ice Rink, Universities, Place Albert I, Place de la Liberté (where you can change to the first line), Train Station, Port du château and Port de Commerce.

Rolling stock

If the second route is to be continued as a tram train on railway tracks, it must be equipped with heavier vehicles than conventional trams.

Individual evidence

All sources are in French.

^ ^A ^b René Courant: Le temps des tramways . Éditions du Cabri, Menton 1982, ISBN 2-903310-22-X , p. 29 .

^ History of the Brest tram, in: Brest Ouvert

↑ Tramway: le grand chantier démarre le 6 juillet . Ouest-France . 2009. Accessed October 1, 2009. In fact, some work had already been completed in the previous month so that the diversions that were necessary for construction work could be set up (removal of bollards, curbs, preparatory measures to drive one-way streets in both directions can…). The work mentioned was not officially part of the construction of the tram, because otherwise a Déclaration d'utilité publique (determination of the public benefit) would also have been necessary for them. The first phase of the work was therefore called the "network laying phase".

↑ The SemTram on Bilan gratuits

↑ ^a ^b ^c The tram on the Brest website ( memo of March 26, 2010 in the Internet Archive )

^ Official website of the Brest tram - reconstruction of the Pont de Recouvrance ( Memento of June 21, 2011 in the Internet Archive )