Berlin S-Bahn
The Berlin S-Bahn is a rapid transit railway system in and around Berlin, the capital city of Germany. It has been in operation under this name since December 1930, having been called the special tariff area Berliner Stadt-, Ring- und Vorortbahnen, it complements the Berlin U-Bahn and is the link to many outer-Berlin areas, such as Berlin Schönefeld Airport. In its first decades of operation, the trains were steam-drawn. Today, the term S-Bahn is used in Berlin only for those lines and trains with third-rail electrical power transmission and the special Berlin S-Bahn loading gauge; the third unique technical feature of the Berlin S-Bahn, the automated mechanical train control, is being phased out and replaced by a communications-based train control system specific to the Berlin S-Bahn. In other parts of Germany and other German-speaking countries, other trains are designated S-Bahn without those Berlin specific features; the Hamburg S-Bahn is the only other system using third-rail electrification.
Today, the Berlin S-Bahn is no longer defined as this special tariff area of the national railway company, but is instead just one specific means of transportation, defined by its special technical characteristics, in an area-wide tariff administered by a public transport authority. The Berlin S-Bahn is now an integral part of the Verkehrsverbund Berlin-Brandenburg, the regional tariff zone for all kinds of public transit in and around Berlin and the federal state of Brandenburg; the brand name "S-Bahn" chosen in 1930 mirrored U-Bahn, which had become the official brand name for the Berlin city-owned rapid transit lines begun under the name of Berliner Hoch- und Untergrundbahnen, where the word of mouth had abbreviated "Untergrundbahn" to "U-Bahn", in parallel to "U-Boot" formed from "Unterseeboot". Services on the Berlin S-Bahn have been provided by the Prussian or German national railway company of the respective time, which means the Deutsche Reichsbahn-Gesellschaft after the First World War, the Deutsche Reichsbahn of the GDR until 1993 and Deutsche Bahn after its incorporation in 1994.
The Berlin S-Bahn consists today of 15 lines serving 166 stations, runs over a total route length of 332 kilometres. The S-Bahn carried 395 million passengers in 2012, it is integrated with the underground U-Bahn to form the backbone of Berlin's rapid transport system. Unlike the U-Bahn, the S-Bahn crosses Berlin city limits into the surrounding state of Brandenburg, e.g. to Potsdam. Although the S- and U-Bahn are part of a unified fare system, they have different operators; the S-Bahn is operated by S-Bahn Berlin GmbH, a subsidiary of Deutsche Bahn, whereas the U-Bahn is run by Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe, the main public transit company for the city of Berlin. The S-Bahn routes all feed into one of three core lines: a central, elevated east-west line, a central underground north-south line, a circular line. Outside the Ringbahn, suburban routes radiate in all directions. Lines S1, S2, S25, S26 are north-south lines that use the North-South tunnel as their midsection, they were distributed into Oranienburg and Hennigsdorf in the north, Teltow Stadt and Wannsee.
Lines S3, S5, S7, S9, S75 are east-west lines using the Stadtbahn cross-city railway. The western termini are located at Potsdam and Spandau, although the S5 only runs as far as Westkreuz and the S75 to Ostkreuz; the eastern termini are Erkner, Strausberg Nord and Wartenberg. The S9 uses a connector curve at Ostkreuz to change from Stadtbahn to the South-eastern leg of the Ringbahn. Another curve, the Nordkurve to the North-eastern Ringbahn, was served by the S86 line, but it was demolished in preparation of the rebuilding of Ostkreuz station and was not rebuilt afterwards. Both connector curves were used in the time of the Berlin Wall, as trains coming from the North-Eastern routes couldn't use the West Berlin North-South route and the Southern leg of the pre- and post-Wall Ringbahn was in West Berlin. Lines S41 and S42 continuously circle around the Ringbahn, the former clockwise, the latter anti-clockwise. Lines S45, S46, S47 link destinations in the southeast with the southern section of the Ringbahn via the tangential link from the Görlitzer Bahn to the Ring via Köllnische Heide.
Lines S8 and S85 are north-south lines using the eastern section of the Ringbahn between Bornholmer Straße and Treptower Park via Ostkreuz, using the Görlitzer Bahn in the South. Speaking, the first digit of a route number denotes the main route or a group of routes. Thus, S25 is a branch of S2, while S41, S42, S45, S46, S47 are all Ringbahn routes that share some of the same route. So S41, S42, S45, S46, S47 are together S4. However, the S4 does not exist as an independent entity. Since 9 January 1984, all the West Berlin S-Bahn routes are labelled with an "S" followed by a number; this system had been in use with other West German S-Bahn systems for years. On 2 June 1991 this was extended to the East Berlin lines as well. Internally, the Berlin S-Bahn uses Zuggruppen which run every twenty minutes; some lines, e.g. the S85, are made up of only one Zuggruppe, while others, like S5, are multiple Zuggruppen combined. Some Zuggruppen do not terminate at intermediate stops. Zuggrupp
East Germany
East Germany the German Democratic Republic, was a country that existed from 1949 to 1990, when the eastern portion of Germany was part of the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War. It described itself as a socialist "workers' and peasants' state", the territory was administered and occupied by Soviet forces at the end of World War II — the Soviet Occupation Zone of the Potsdam Agreement, bounded on the east by the Oder–Neisse line; the Soviet zone did not include it. The German Democratic Republic was established in the Soviet zone, while the Federal Republic was established in the three western zones. East Germany was a satellite state of the Soviet Union. Soviet occupation authorities began transferring administrative responsibility to German communist leaders in 1948, the GDR began to function as a state on 7 October 1949. However, Soviet forces remained in the country throughout the Cold War; until 1989, the GDR was governed by the Socialist Unity Party, though other parties nominally participated in its alliance organisation, the National Front of Democratic Germany.
The SED made the teaching of Marxism -- the Russian language compulsory in schools. The economy was centrally planned and state-owned. Prices of housing, basic goods and services were set by central government planners rather than rising and falling through supply and demand. Although the GDR had to pay substantial war reparations to the USSR, it became the most successful economy in the Eastern Bloc. Emigration to the West was a significant problem – as many of the emigrants were well-educated young people, it further weakened the state economically; the government fortified its western borders and, in 1961, built the Berlin Wall. Many people attempting to flee were killed by border guards or booby traps, such as landmines. Several others were imprisoned for many years. In 1989, numerous social and political forces in the GDR and abroad led to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the establishment of a government committed to liberalisation; the following year, open elections were held, international negotiations led to the signing of the Final Settlement treaty on the status and borders of Germany.
The GDR dissolved itself, Germany was reunified on 3 October 1990, becoming a sovereign state again. Several of the GDR's leaders, notably its last communist leader Egon Krenz, were prosecuted in reunified Germany for crimes committed during the Cold War. Geographically, the German Democratic Republic bordered the Baltic Sea to the north. Internally, the GDR bordered the Soviet sector of Allied-occupied Berlin, known as East Berlin, administered as the state's de facto capital, it bordered the three sectors occupied by the United States, United Kingdom and France known collectively as West Berlin. The three sectors occupied by the Western nations were sealed off from the rest of the GDR by the Berlin Wall from its construction in 1961 until it was brought down in 1989; the official name was Deutsche Demokratische Republik abbreviated to DDR. Both terms were used in East Germany, with increasing usage of the abbreviated form since East Germany considered West Germans and West Berliners to be foreigners following the promulgation of its second constitution in 1968.
West Germans, the western media and statesmen avoided the official name and its abbreviation, instead using terms like Ostzone, Sowjetische Besatzungszone, sogenannte DDR. The centre of political power in East Berlin was referred to as Pankow. Over time, the abbreviation DDR was increasingly used colloquially by West Germans and West German media; the term Westdeutschland, when used by West Germans, was always a reference to the geographic region of Western Germany and not to the area within the boundaries of the Federal Republic of Germany. However, this use was not always consistent. Before World War II, Ostdeutschland was used to describe all the territories east of the Elbe, as reflected in the works of sociologist Max Weber and political theorist Carl Schmitt. Explaining the internal impact of the DDR regime from the perspective of German history in the long term, historian Gerhard A. Ritter has argued that the East German state was defined by two dominant forces – Soviet Communism on the one hand, German traditions filtered through the interwar experiences of German Communists on the other.
It always was constrained by the powerful example of the prosperous West, to which East Germans compared their nation. The changes wrought by the Communists were most apparent in ending capitalism and transforming industry and agriculture, in the militarization of society, in the political thrust of the educational system and the media. On the other hand, there was little change made in the independent domains of the sciences, the engineering professions, the Protestant churches, in many bourgeois lifestyles. Social policy, says Ritter, became a critical legitimization tool in the last decades and mixed socialist and traditional elements about equally. At the Yalta Conference during World War II, the Allies (the U. S. the UK and
Rapid transit
Rapid transit or mass rapid transit known as heavy rail, subway, tube, U-Bahn or underground, is a type of high-capacity public transport found in urban areas. Unlike buses or trams, rapid transit systems are electric railways that operate on an exclusive right-of-way, which cannot be accessed by pedestrians or other vehicles of any sort, and, grade separated in tunnels or on elevated railways. Modern services on rapid transit systems are provided on designated lines between stations using electric multiple units on rail tracks, although some systems use guided rubber tires, magnetic levitation, or monorail; the stations have high platforms, without steps inside the trains, requiring custom-made trains in order to minimize gaps between train and platform. They are integrated with other public transport and operated by the same public transport authorities. However, some rapid transit systems have at-grade intersections between a rapid transit line and a road or between two rapid transit lines.
It is unchallenged in its ability to transport large numbers of people over short distances with little to no use of land. The world's first rapid transit system was the underground Metropolitan Railway which opened as a conventional railway in 1863, now forms part of the London Underground. In 1868, New York opened the elevated West Side and Yonkers Patent Railway a cable-hauled line using static steam engines. China has the largest number of rapid transit systems in the world at 31, with over 4,500 km of lines and is responsible for most of the world's rapid transit expansion in the past decade; the world's longest single-operator rapid transit system by route length is the Shanghai Metro. The world's largest single rapid transit service provider by number of stations is the New York City Subway; the busiest rapid transit systems in the world by annual ridership are the Tokyo subway system, the Seoul Metropolitan Subway, the Moscow Metro, the Beijing Subway, the Shanghai Metro, the Guangzhou Metro, the New York City Subway, the Mexico City Metro, the Paris Métro, the Hong Kong MTR.
Metro is the most common term for underground rapid transit systems used by non-native English speakers. Rapid transit systems may be named after the medium by which passengers travel in busy central business districts. One of these terms may apply to an entire system if a large part of the network runs at ground level. In most of Britain, a subway is a pedestrian underpass. In Scotland, the Glasgow Subway underground rapid transit system is known as the Subway. In most of North America, underground mass transit systems are known as subways; the term metro is a shortened reference to a metropolitan area. Chicago's commuter rail system that serves the entire metropolitan area is called Metra, while its rapid transit system that serves the city is called the "L". Rapid transit systems such as the Washington Metro, Los Angeles Metro Rail, the Miami Metrorail, the Montreal Metro are called the Metro; the opening of London's steam-hauled Metropolitan Railway in 1863 marked the beginning of rapid transit.
Initial experiences with steam engines, despite ventilation, were unpleasant. Experiments with pneumatic railways failed in their extended adoption by cities. Electric traction was more efficient and cleaner than steam and the natural choice for trains running in tunnels and proved superior for elevated services. In 1890 the City & South London Railway was the first electric-traction rapid transit railway, fully underground. Prior to opening the line was to be called the "City and South London Subway", thus introducing the term Subway into railway terminology. Both railways, alongside others, were merged into London Underground; the 1893 Liverpool Overhead Railway was designed to use electric traction from the outset. The technology spread to other cities in Europe, the United States and Canada, with some railways being converted from steam and others being designed to be electric from the outset. Budapest, Chicago and New York all converted or purpose-designed and built electric rail services.
Advancements in technology have allowed new automated services. Hybrid solutions have evolved, such as tram-train and premetro, which incorporate some of the features of rapid transit systems. In response to cost, engineering considerations and topological challenges some cities have opted to construct tram systems those in Australia, where density in cities was low and suburbs tended to spread out. Since the 1970s, the viability of underground train systems in Australian cities Sydney and Melbourne, has been reconsidered and proposed as a solution to over-capacity. Since the 1960s many new systems were introduced in Europe and Latin America. In the 21st century, most new expansions and systems are located in Asia, with China becoming the world's leader in metro expansion operating some of the largest systems and possessing 60 cities operating, constructing or planning a rapid transit system. Rapid transit is used in cities and metropolitan areas to transport large numbers of people short distances at high frequency.
The extent of the rapid transit system varies between cities, with se
East Berlin
East Berlin was the de facto capital city of the German Democratic Republic from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945; the American and French sectors were known as West Berlin. From 13 August 1961 until 9 November 1989, East Berlin was separated from West Berlin by the Berlin Wall; the Western Allied powers did not recognise East Berlin as the GDR's capital, nor the GDR's authority to govern East Berlin. With the London Protocol of 1944 signed on September 12, 1944, the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union decided to divide Germany into three occupation zones and to establish a special area of Berlin, occupied by the three Allied Forces together. In May 1945, the Soviet Union installed a city government for the whole city, called "Magistrate of Greater Berlin", which existed until 1947. After the war, the Allied Forces administered the city together within the Allied Kommandatura, which served as the governing body of the city. However, in 1948 the Soviet representative left the Kommandatura and the common administration broke apart during the following months.
In the Soviet sector, a separate city government was established, which continued to call itself "Magistrate of Greater Berlin". When the German Democratic Republic was established in 1949, it claimed East Berlin as its capital - a claim, recognised by all Communist countries, its representatives to the People's Chamber were not directly elected and did not have full voting rights until 1981. In June 1948, all railways and roads leading to West Berlin were blocked, East Berliners were not allowed to emigrate. More than 1,000 East Germans were escaping to West Berlin each day by 1960, caused by the strains on the East German economy from war reparations owed to the Soviet Union, massive destruction of industry, lack of assistance from the Marshall Plan. In August 1961, the East German Government tried to stop the population exodus by enclosing West Berlin within the Berlin Wall, it was dangerous for fleeing residents to cross because armed soldiers were trained to shoot illegal migrants. East Germany was a socialist republic.
Privileges such as prestigious apartments and good schooling were given to members of the ruling party and their family. Christian churches were allowed to operate without restraint after years of harassment by authorities. In the 1970s, wages of East Berliners rose and working hours fell; the Western Allies never formally acknowledged the authority of the East German government to govern East Berlin. The United States Command Berlin, for example, published detailed instructions for U. S. military and civilian personnel wishing to visit East Berlin. In fact, the three Western commandants protested against the presence of the East German National People's Army in East Berlin on the occasion of military parades; the three Western Allies established embassies in East Berlin in the 1970s, although they never recognised it as the capital of East Germany. Treaties instead used terms such as "seat of government."On 3 October 1990, East and West Germany and East and West Berlin were reunited, thus formally ending the existence of East Berlin.
Since reunification, the German government has spent vast amounts of money on reintegrating the two halves of the city and bringing services and infrastructure in the former East Berlin up to the standard established in West Berlin. After reunification, the East German economy suffered significantly. Many East German factories were shut down due to inability to comply with West German pollution and safety standards, as well as inability to compete with West German factories; because of this, a massive amount of West German economic aid was poured into East Germany to revitalize it. This stimulus was part-funded through a 7.5% tax on income, which led to a great deal of resentment toward the East Germans. Despite the large sums of economic aid poured into East Berlin, there still remain obvious differences between the former East and West Berlin. East Berlin has a distinct visual style; the unique look of Stalinist architecture, used in East Berlin contrasts markedly with the urban development styles employed in the former West Berlin.
Additionally, the former East Berlin retains a small number of its GDR-era street and place names commemorating German socialist heroes, such as Karl-Marx-Allee, Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz, Karl-Liebknecht-Straße. Many such names, were deemed inappropriate and changed after a long process of review. Another popular symbolic icon of the former East Berlin is the "Ampelmännchen", a stylized version of a fedora-wearing man crossing the street, found on traffic lights at many pedestrian crosswalks throughout the former East; these days they are visible in parts of the former West Berlin. Following a civic debate about whether the Ampelmännchen should be abolished or disseminated more several crosswalks in some parts of the former West Berlin employ the Ampelmännchen. Twenty-five years after the two cities were reunified, the people of East and West Berlin still had noticeable differences between each other, which become more apparent amo
Public transport
Public transport is transport of passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public managed on a schedule, operated on established routes, that charge a posted fee for each trip. Examples of public transport include city buses, trolleybuses and passenger trains, rapid transit and ferries. Public transport between cities is dominated by airlines and intercity rail. High-speed rail networks are being developed in many parts of the world. Most public transport systems run along fixed routes with set embarkation/disembarkation points to a prearranged timetable, with the most frequent services running to a headway. However, most public transport trips include other modes of travel, such as passengers walking or catching bus services to access train stations. Share taxis offer on-demand services in many parts of the world, which may compete with fixed public transport lines, or compliment them, by bringing passengers to interchanges. Paratransit is sometimes used for people who need a door-to-door service.
Urban public transit differs distinctly among Asia, North America, Europe. In Asia, profit-driven, privately-owned and publicly traded mass transit and real estate conglomerates predominantly operate public transit systems In North America, municipal transit authorities most run mass transit operations. In Europe, both state-owned and private companies predominantly operate mass transit systems, Public transport services can be profit-driven by use of pay-by-the-distance fares or funded by government subsidies in which flat rate fares are charged to each passenger. Services can be profitable through high usership numbers and high farebox recovery ratios, or can be regulated and subsidised from local or national tax revenue. Subsidised, free of charge services operate in some towns and cities. For geographical and economic reasons, differences exist internationally regarding use and extent of public transport. While countries in the Old World tend to have extensive and frequent systems serving their old and dense cities, many cities of the New World have more sprawl and much less comprehensive public transport.
The International Association of Public Transport is the international network for public transport authorities and operators, policy decision-makers, scientific institutes and the public transport supply and service industry. It has 3,400 members from 92 countries from all over the globe. Conveyances designed for public hire are as old as the first ferries, the earliest public transport was water transport: on land people walked or rode an animal. Ferries appear in Greek mythology—corpses in ancient Greece were buried with a coin underneath their tongue to pay the ferryman Charon to take them to Hades; some historical forms of public transport include the stagecoach, traveling a fixed route between coaching inns, the horse-drawn boat carrying paying passengers, a feature of European canals from their 17th-century origins. The canal itself as a form of infrastructure dates back to antiquity – ancient Egyptians used a canal for freight transportation to bypass the Aswan cataract – and the Chinese built canals for water transportation as far back as the Warring States period which began in the 5th century BCE.
Whether or not those canals were used for for-hire public transport remains unknown. The omnibus, the first organized public transit system within a city, appears to have originated in Paris, France, in 1662, although the service in question failed a few months after its founder, Blaise Pascal, died in August 1662; the omnibus was introduced to London in July 1829. The first passenger horse-drawn railway opened in 1806: it ran between Swansea and Mumbles in southwest Wales in the United Kingdom. In 1825 George Stephenson built the Locomotion for the Stockton and Darlington Railway in northeast England, the first public steam railway in the world; the first successful electric streetcar was built for 12 miles of track for the Union Passenger Railway in Richmond, Virginia in 1888. Electric streetcars could carry heavier passenger loads than predecessors, which reduced fares and stimulated greater transit use. Two years after the Richmond success, over thirty two thousand electric streetcars were operating in America.
Electric streetcars paved the way for the first subway system in America. Before electric streetcars, steam powered subways were considered. However, most people believed that riders would avoid the smoke filled subway tunnels from the steam engines. In 1894, Boston built the first subway in the United States, an electric streetcar line in a 1.5 mile tunnel under Tremont Street’s retail district. Other cities such as New York followed, constructing hundreds of miles of subway in the following decades. Aerial lift Aerial tramway Funifor Chairlift Detachable chairlift Funitel Gondola lift Maritime transport Ferry Cable ferry Reaction ferry Water taxi Land transport Personal public transport Bicycle-sharing system Carsharing Personal rapid transit Rail transport Inter-city rail High-speed rail Maglev Urban rail transit Airport rail link Atmospheric railway Automated guideway transit Cable car Cable railway Commuter rail Elevated railway Funicular Inclined elevator Light rail Medium-capacity rail system Mono
Double-decker bus
A double-decker bus is a bus that has two storeys or decks. Double-decker buses are used for mass transport in the United Kingdom, Europe and many former European possessions, the most iconic example being the red London bus. Early double-deckers put the driver in a separate cab. Passenger access was via an open platform at the rear, a bus conductor would collect fares. Modern double-deckers have a main entrance door at the front, the driver takes fares, thus halving the number of bus workers aboard, but slowing the boarding process; the rear open platform, popular with passengers, was abandoned for safety reasons, as there was a risk of passengers falling when running and jumping onto the bus. Double-deckers are for commuter transport but open-top models are used as sight-seeing buses for tourists. William Gladstone, speaking of London's double-deck horse drawn omnibuses, once observed that "...the best way to see London is from the top of a bus". Cities listed here have double-decker buses as part of their regular mass transit fleet.
Cities with only tourist and sightseeing double-decker buses are excluded. The first commercial horse-drawn double-decker omnibuses were introduced in England in 1847 by Adams & Co. of Fairfield, Bow improved upon by John Greenwood, who introduced a new double-decker in 1852. Double-decker buses are in common use throughout the United Kingdom, have been favoured over articulated buses by many operators because of the shorter length of double-deckers and larger amount of seating capacity; the majority of double-decker buses in the UK are between 9.5 metres and 11.1 metres long, the latter being more common since the mid-1990s, though there are three-axle 12-metre models in service with some operators. Double-decker coaches in the UK have traditionally been 12.0 metres in length, though many newer models are about 13.75 metres. The maximum permissible length of a rigid double-decker bus and coach in the UK is 15.0 metres, however the total maximum dimensions, including trailer or articulated section, in normal circumstances are.
Articulated double-deckers are allowed at a maximum length of 18.65 metres. In 1941, Miss Phyllis Thompson became the first woman licensed to drive a double-decker vehicle in the United Kingdom, she drove for the bus company Felix Bus Services at Hatfield near Doncaster. The red double-decker buses in London have become a national symbol of England; the majority of buses in London are double-deckers. A iconic example was the AEC Routemaster bus, a staple of the public transport network in London for nearly half a century following its introduction in 1956; because of cited difficulties accommodating disabled passengers, the last remaining Routemasters in use retired from general service in 2005. Transport for London has continued to keep these vintage buses in operation on heritage route 15H, there was a second heritage route but this ceased operation in 2014 due to low patronage and increased operation costs. In 2007, a hybrid-powered double-decker entered service on London Buses route 141. By late 2008, more hybrid double-deckers from three manufacturers entered service in London.
A New Routemaster was developed that year, entered service on 20 February 2012. In October 2015, London added five all-electric double-decker buses - the world's first - made by Chinese firm BYD. Bus Vannin operate several double-deckers on routes all across the island. In the Republic of Ireland, nearly all of buses operated in and around Greater Dublin by Dublin Bus are double-deckers. There are 936 double-decker buses in the company's fleet of 942. Bus Éireann utilises double-decker buses on some of its commuter routes, such as the Dublin to Dundalk service. Double-deckers are common on some of the company's suburban routes in Cork city. More luxurious Double-Deckers are used on Intercity Routes like the XI Dublin-Belfast Route or X3/X4 Dublin-Derry route. Double decker buses were in use on city services in Vienna between 1960 and 1991, they are used on services between Vienna and its airport, operated by Ötztaler Verkehrsgesellschaft under contract to ÖBB-Postbus on service 4420 between Innsbruck and Lienz.
Since 1970, various operators of Copenhagen city transport were using double-deckers—originally Leyland, in the 1980s-90s MAN and in the 2000s Volvo, derivates of model B7. The first French double-decker bus was brought into service in Paris in 1853; the upper floor was cheaper and uncovered. The first double-decker motor bus in Paris, the Schneider Brillié P2, appeared in 1906, it was designed to replace the horse-drawn double-decker omnibus. Like trams and omnibuses, double-decker motor buses included two classes of travel: first class inside the car and second class outdoors on top, but this type of vehicle was withdrawn in 1911. It was not until 1966. A prototype built by Berliet, was put into service in 1966, with an order being placed for 25 vehicles; the first production car was commissioned on 19 June 1968 on Gare Montparnasse - Levallois. On 17 February 1969, Opera - Porte d'Asnieres was in turn equipped with this model, but traffic problems caused RATP to definitively abandon this ve
Trams in Berlin
The Berlin tramway is the main tram system in Berlin, Germany. It is one of the oldest tram networks in the world having its origins in 1865 and is operated by Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe, founded in 1929, it is notable for being the third-largest tram system in the world, after Melbourne and St. Petersburg. Berlin's streetcar system is made up of 22 lines that operate across a standard gauge network, with 800 stops and measuring 190 kilometres in route length and 430 kilometres in line length. Nine of the lines, called Metrotram, operate 24 hours a day and are identified with the letter "M" before their number. Most of the recent network is within the confines of the former East Berlin—tram lines within West Berlin having been replaced by buses during the division of Berlin. In the eastern vicinity of the city there are three private tram lines that are not part of the main system, whereas to the south-west of Berlin is the Potsdam tram system with its own network of lines. In 1865, a horse tramway was established in Berlin.
In 1881, the world's first electric tram line opened. Numerous private and municipal operating companies constructed new routes, so by the end of the 19th century the network developed quite and the horse trams were changed into electric ones. By 1930, the network had a route length of over 630 km with more than 90 lines. In 1929, all operating companies were unified into the BVG. After World War II, BVG was divided into an eastern and a western company but was once again reunited in 1992, after the fall of East Germany. In West Berlin, by 1967 the last tram lines had been shut down. With the exception of two lines constructed after German reunification, the Berlin tram continues to be limited to the eastern portion of Berlin; the public transport system of Berlin is the oldest one in Germany. In 1825, the first bus line from Brandenburger Tor to Charlottenburg was opened by Simon Kremser with a timetable; the first bus service inside the city has operated since 1840 between Alexanderplatz and Potsdamer Bahnhof.
It was run by Israel Moses Henoch, who had organized the cab service since 1815. On 1 January 1847, the Concessionierte Berliner Omnibus Compagnie started its first horse-bus line; the growing market witnessed the launch of numerous additional companies, with 36 bus companies in Berlin by 1864. On 22 June 1865, the opening of Berlin's first horse tramway marked the beginning of the age of trams in Germany, spanning from Brandenburger Tor along today's Straße des 17. Juni to Charlottenburg. Two months on 28 August, it was extended along Dorotheenstraße to Kupfergraben near today's Museumsinsel, a terminal stop, still in service today. Like the horse-bus, many companies followed the new development and built horse-tram networks in all parts of the today's urban area. In 1873, a route from Rosenthaler Platz to the Gesundbrunnen was opened, to be operated by the new Große Berliner Pferde-Eisenbahn which would become the dominant company in Berlin under the name of Große Berliner Straßenbahn. On 16 May 1881, the region of Berlin again wrote transport history.
In the village of Groß-Lichterfelde, incorporated into Berlin-Steglitz 39 years Werner von Siemens opened the world's first electric tramway. The electric tram in Groß-Lichterfelde was built to 1,000 mm metre gauge and ran from today's suburban station, Lichterfelde Ost, to the cadet school on Zehlendorfer Straße; the route was intended as a testing facility. Siemens named it an "elevated line taken down from its pillars and girders" because he wanted to build a network of electric elevated lines in Berlin, but the skeptical town council did not allow him to do this until 1902, when the first elevated line opened. The first tests of electric traction on Berlin's standard gauge began on 1 May 1882, with overhead supply and in 1886 with chemical accumulators, were not successful. Definitively, electric traction of standard-gauge trams in Berlin was established in 1895; the first tram line with an overhead track supply ran in an industrial area near Berlin-Gesundbrunnen station. The first line in more a representative area took place with accumulators for its first year, but got a catenary, four years later.
In 1902, the electrification with overhead wiring had been completed, except for few lines on the periphery. The last horse-drawn tram line closed in 1910. On 28 December 1899, it became possible to travel underground under the Spree, upon completion of the Spreetunnel between Stralau and Treptow. Owing to structural problems, it was closed on 25 February 1932. From 1916 to 1951, the tram had a second tunnel, the Lindentunnel, passing under the well-known boulevard Unter den Linden; the history of tramway companies of the Berlin Strassenbahn is complicated. Besides the private companies, which changed because of takeovers and bankruptcies, the cities of Berlin, Spandau, Köpenick, Rixdorf; the most important private operating company was the Große Berliner Pferde-Eisenbahn, which called itself Große Berliner Straßenbahn after starting the electrification. GBS acquired nearly all of the other companies through the years. In 1920, the GBS merge
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subway line in Berlin in particular project management and controlling as well as project marketing for the BVG.
Media related to Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe at Wikimedia Commons
