X-Nico

7 unusual facts about Vicinal tramway


Charleroi Metro

This branch runs on the street as a normal tram after Pétria station, following a line of the old Vicinal network.

Prior to that date, several trams were still wearing the old SNCV livery with an orange bottom and beige top separated by a blue line (wearing a 4 digit number starting with 61).

The Jumet to Gosselies section is new, although it is built on the site of former SNCV tramway lines.

Charleroi Metro line 89

The line 90 which used the Charleroi Metro infrastructure was an hybrid between this historical line (between Charleroi and Binche) and SNCV line 36 (between Binche and La Louvière).

Line 89 existed before the first stations of the Charleroi Pre-metro were inaugurated in 1976, as an SNCV tram line linking Charleroi and Anderlues.

Vicinal

Vicinal tramway or Buurtspoor, a system of narrow gauge tramways or local railways in Belgium.

Vicinal tramway

SNCV/NMVB was broken up in 1991 into De Lijn (for Flanders) and TEC (for Wallonia), both companies primarily operating buses.


PCC streetcar

The PCC technology was exported to Europe, with La Brugeoise et Nivelles (now the BN division of Bombardier) of Bruges, Belgium, building several hundred streetcars that saw service in Brussels, Antwerp, Ghent, The Hague, Saint-Étienne, Marseille and Belgrade (the latter city buying vehicles initially used by the Belgian Vicinal railways).


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