Caen tram

Caen tram
Car 1008 and 1022 on Place Saint-Pierre
Basic information
Country	France
city	Caen
opening	July 27, 2019
operator	Keolis Caen
Infrastructure
Route length	16.2 km
Gauge	1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Power system	750 V DC overhead line
Stops	37
business
Lines	3
Clock in the peak hours	10 min
vehicles	23 Alstom Citadis 305

The Caen tram ( French: Tramway de Caen ) is the tram system of the French city of Caen . The first three lines went into operation on July 27, 2019.

A meter-gauge electric tram network existed in Caen from 1901. It was shut down in 1937 in favor of bus operations .

First tram

history

Passage of the meter-gauge tram in Rue Saint-Jean

Saint-Pierre train station with the Chemins de fer du Calvados train

Art nouveau style tram shelters

On April 27, 1895, a horse-drawn bus line went into operation in Caen , connecting the Gare de l'Ouest station (now the main train station) with the Place des Petites-Boucheries. The Car Ripert buses initially ran from 7:30 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. every 20 minutes. In the same year, operations were expanded and the traffic period extended; from mid-May 1898, the vehicles left the terminus every ten minutes.

At the end of 1896, the city council considered the introduction of an electrically powered tram for the first time. In January 1897, the Châlons-sur-Marne tram operators asked for a concession for Caen. The Paris- based Compagnie générale de traction was commissioned on April 14, 1897 with the construction of three tram lines within two years and their operation. However, numerous change requests delayed the start of construction. In June 1899 the construction of the power station and the first work in the street area began. The delivery of the track material was a long time coming, however, the rails did not arrive in Caen until the end of January 1900. On April 23 of that year, the first tracks were laid at the La Maladrerie terminus.

On January 19, 1900, the city agreed with the Compagnie générale de traction to create a public limited company to operate the tramway. As such, the Compagnie des tramways électriques de Caen (TEC) was founded in the summer of 1900, in which the Compagnie générale de traction held more than 90% of the shares.

The first electric tram line with the number 1 went into operation on December 2, 1901. It connected the Gare de l'Ouest and Gare Saint-Martin stations. Line 2 followed a week later and ran from Rue de Falaise to the suburb of La Maladrerie. Line 3 from the Pont de Courtonne at the Saint-Pierre station on the narrow-gauge Chemins de fer du Calvados to the suburb of Venoix was opened on December 21, 1901. The Chemins de fer du Calvados served, with steam trains on tracks with a gauge of 600 mm, from Saint-Pierre to Ouistreham and other coastal towns.

Extensions and new routes were planned, but ultimately not implemented. A section of the line to Clopée was only completed in November 1919, but due to differences in the distribution of operating costs, the line never went into operation. On December 1, 1918, line layouts were changed and a new line 5 was introduced, which only survived in regular service until June 1920. After the First World War , the operating company's balance sheet worsened, which then made tickets more expensive and abolished transfer tickets. Disputes with the city regarding the compensation of special loads even led to a temporary suspension of operations.

From 1932 the city administration tried to replace the trams with omnibuses. A first bus line led from August 1st of that year to the hospital Hôpital Clemenceau, where a tram route had not been built. The bus operator was again TEC. On January 23, 1937, a tram ran for the last time on the meter-gauge network of Caen.

vehicles

Line 1 railcar on avenue de Courseulles

The tram was operated with a direct voltage of 500 volts, which was fed to the two-axle vehicles via a pantograph with a contact roller made from a contact wire . Because of the steep gradients, the railcars had two 25 hp engines . Three braking systems (two types of block brakes , electric brakes and compressed air brakes ) ensured safety on slopes.

In accordance with the specifications of the specifications , the railcars were 8.30 m long and only 1.99 m wide. They had 30 seats, including six in first class , and 24 standing places on the platforms. Sidecars were also used on line 3.

After the tram was discontinued, the vehicles were sold to the Cherbourg tram .

Routes and lines

Line network of the year 1909: 10-minute traffic on the solid lines, 20-minute traffic on the dashed lines

The entire network was laid out on a single track and had several turnouts. Lines 1 and 2 ran together on the 1250 m long section in the center between Rue de Vaucelles and Rue au Canu. Lines 2 and 3 shared a 228 m long stretch. All lines met at Place Saint-Pierre.

In 1907 three lines were operated:

Line 1: Gare de l'Ouest – Gare Saint-Martin (2688 m)
Line 2: Octroi de Falaise – Maladrerie (4978 m), every second train only to the corner of Rue de Bayeux / Rue de Bicoquet
Line 3: Pont de Courtonne – Venoix (3388 m), every second train only to the beginning of Rue de Bayeux

The operating times were from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., the train sequence was ten minutes.

Infrastructure

The depot was built in the extension of line 3 in the Rue Fresnel in the city center.

TVR

Meeting of two TVRs in the city center

Lines of the disused TVR

Planning for a new local transport system for Caen began as early as 1988. Since a classic tram was considered too expensive, the choice fell on the then pioneering TVR system of the Tramway sur pneumatiques type . After a construction period of three years, it was finally opened on November 18, 2002. A total of 15.7 km of route was put into operation, on which two lines operated. They shared a trunk line that crossed the city in a north-south direction, and branched out at its ends.

Because of the high susceptibility to breakdowns, which led to capacity bottlenecks during rush hour , and the high maintenance costs, the originally expected financial advantage of the TVR system turned into the opposite. On December 14, 2011, it was therefore decided to shut down the TVR system in 2016 and to build a conventional tram on the same routes by 2018, especially since Bombardier had already announced that it would no longer pursue the TVR concept. However, the conversion was delayed, until December 31, 2017 TVR trains were in passenger traffic.

New tram

Routes and lines

In the summer of 2019, three tram lines with a total length of 16.2 km were put into operation. They connect Caen with the suburbs of Hérouville-Saint-Clair , Ifs and Fleury-sur-Orne . The official opening took place as part of a large community festival on July 27, 2019.

All lines use a common section or parts of it in the city center of Caen. Of the 37 stops, five in the city center are served by all three lines. To the north, this trunk line branches off in branches to Caen Campus 2 and Hérouville-Saint-Clair. In the southern center, a short branch from Quai de Juillet to Presqu'ile station is planned. Further south, the trunk line divides into branches to Fleury and Ifs at the Poincaré station . 74,000 residents, 47,000 jobs and 27,000 schoolchildren and students are accessible from the new tram.

The standard-gauge tracks were laid on the previous lanes of the TVR, plus 1.5 km of new lines. About half of the routes are laid out as grass tracks, the length of the stops has been adapted to that of the tram vehicles. The construction costs were estimated at almost 250 million euros.

vehicles

The Caen-la-Mer municipal association ( Communauté urbaine Caen la Mer ) ordered 23 five-part low-floor Alstom Citadis X05 multiple units for the new tram . The first tram multiple unit for Caen was presented on July 10, 2018 at the manufacturing plant in La Rochelle , delivery of the 23 vehicles ordered began on October 8, 2018. They are 33 m long and 2.40 m wide. The total cost of the vehicles was estimated at 51.5 million euros. From December 2018, the first railways were on their way to test drives in Caen.

The railcars have the road numbers 1001 to 1023, the 1009 carries a full advertisement for the new tram. Three more vehicles of the same type were reordered in 2019.

Depot

The tram operation received a depot in the municipality of Fleury-sur-Orne. It was completed in March 2019 and includes all maintenance and monitoring facilities including the control center.

literature

Alain de Dieuleveult: Calvados pour les Petits Trains . Éditions Cénomane, Le Mans 1997, ISBN 2-902808-74-7 .
Bernhard Kußmagk: Caen - T-Day in Normandy . Tram magazine, issue 10/2019, page 20.