Tramspotting (part I)

Although I take the Metro to work every day, my favourite mode of transport is the tram. Sure, the Metro is quick and direct, but it lives underground and isn't such a visible part of our day-to-day life. The trams are more diverse and have much more character. They can be little old metal boxes rattling along a city centre street (the PCC 7000 series), or they can be long sleek snakes gliding between avenues of trees (the T4000 series), or they can be something in between (the PCC 7700, PCC 7900, T2000 or T3000 series). They can go underground or on the surface, or even on bridges over the ring.

The picture below shows one of the new generation of trams, the T3000, near to where I live:



I'm not the only tram enthusiast in Brussels (not by a long shot), and there is plenty of information, and plenty of pictures, on the web, and there is also a lovely tram museum in Woluwe, from which you can take rides in the old trams out to Tervuren and back. I have added links to two of the best web sites on Brussels trams in the links section – http://www.mivbreiziger.be/ (that is 'MIVB Reiziger' or 'user of the MIVB', the Dutch-language acronym for the transport system), and http://www.b8756.be/, which has a large collection of pictures of Brussels trams. There are also hundreds of pictures on Flickr (use 'Brussels trams' as a search term), some very nice, and finally, there are a number of videos on Youtube, mostly of dubious quality (most of them are probably filmed with a GSM)

Trams are a subject that I will return to regularly on this Blog. In later entries I will include some of my own pictures of the different types of trams to be found in Brussels, as well as whatever technical information is available. When the Tram Museum re-opens (it is currently closed for rrenovation) I'll add some pictures and information from Brussels long and interesting history of trams.