Talk:Tram

"sometimes simply strung, sometimes on a catenary.[2"
This line seems wrong. A catenary is the shape in which a uniform chain or flexible wire hangs between points of support. So a "simply strung" copper wire at rest will closely approximate a catenary, unless the wire or wires are very thick and stiff. Of course it will be distorted by contact with the trolley and by wind. — Preceding unsigned comment added by David R. Ingham (talk • contribs) 00:55, 23 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Technically, you are correct. But in tramway overhead consisting of a single wire (the trolley/contact wire), the mass per unit length and the tension in the wire are such that it does not really appear to have any significant drop between supports. When the trolley/contact wire is supported from another wire (sometimes on tramways but almost always on railways), that upper wire does have the form of a visible catenary. In that case, the word "catenary" is applied to the supporting wire, and the whole arrangement is referred to as "catenary overhead" or, sometimes, just "catenary". — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shrdlu junction (talk • contribs) 00:16, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Article Division?
This article is waaay too long. Perhaps we could consider moving sections to new articles (which I've done for the "Design" section) and providing a summary in their place, or removing information that is already present in existing articles. There are two things we could do: Jh15s (talk) 08:09, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The history section should be checked to see if it shares the same information as the History of Trams article, and vice versa. If there are differences in the two articles, the differences should be merged into the History of Trams article and a summary left instead in the "History" section of the main Trams article (this one).
 * The lists of trams systems and statistics should similarly be checked for differences and be merged with their respective main articles. Similarly a summary should also be provided.

Main photo
The quaint picture of a Tatra T3 - doesn't really showcase the current state of trams/streetcars in 2020 - most of which are now low floor, contemporary vehicles. Any suggestions on a main photo replacement? Turini2 (talk) 13:39, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Melbourne Trams
The article states that the Melbourne tram system is "generally recognised as one of the largest in the world". This is not true, it is generally recognised as THE largest system in the world. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.45.209.198 (talk) 13:24, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

Trams and light rail
There is the list headed "Other large transit networks that operate streetcar and light rail systems include". At least for some of them, I wonder what the "light rail systems" included are. This is true for example for Leipzig, which has classic tramways and railway trains, and nothing else. Perhaps the S-Bahn is included here, but that is definitely heavy rail (legally, an S-Bahn train is a railway train like any other in Germany). Plus if S-Bahn is included, cities like Berlin should show up as well. The list contains Riga, but in Riga there are trams and railways (and trolleybuses, but these can't count as "light rail", since they have no rails). The railways, being broad gauge, are actually pretty heavy, nobody would describe them as "light rail". The same is true for Iasi (not broad gauge, but still nothing resembling light rail in Iasi). So many inclusions in this list seem dubious.91.125.192.100 (talk) 21:36, 11 August 2021 (UTC)