Probably every city is nowadays facing issues with the public transportation such how to accommodate the amount of people heading to work and back, how to solve busy streets and traffic jams etc. Town with 350 000 inhabitants, located in Germany, state Nordrhein-Westfalen had these problems solved 100 years ago. How? Simple solution: the floating tram.
The Wuppertal floating tram: imagine to travel to work with such experience
In German called “Wuppertaler Schwebebahn” opened for its usage March 1, 1901. Even in that time it was not a new invention though. Already in 1824 Henry Robinsom Palmer presented an idea for the railway based on suspension railway where carriages were drawn by horses. This idea continuously started getting the attention of politicians and the public and the construction could start.
If the usual traffic is busy, it´s still ok. The floating tram is on time.
The height status of the track is 8 m in locations above the streets and 12 m when being above the Wupper River. If you´re wondering about the safety, the bearing steel frame have been modernised and technically updated in 2010. If you´re visiting this region of Germany, this would be a great tip for a visit.
The construction picture from about 1900
The “schwebebahn” also appeared in number of movies, one of them is from 2011- the dance movie Pina from Win Wenders, or the movie The Princess and the Warrior (Der Krieger und die Kaiserin) from Tom Tykwer from 2000.
Picture resource: picture1, picture2, picture3