Museum of the urban transport of Brussels

The Museum of the urban transport of Brussels or Musée of the tram is installed in the old classified deposits of Woluwé-Saint-Pierre along the avenue of Tervuren with Brussels.

The rise of the trams in Brussels

After having built the first station of railroad of the continent, in 1835, the city also played a precursory part in the field of the urban transport on rail The first bus cars with equine traction, made their appearance in Brussels towards 1860, time of rapid urban development apart from old the limiting of the city following the abolition of the Octroi. As of 1866, the city concedes the first tram line on rails with equine traction, known as " tram américain" with the partner Belgian Street Railways . This first line makes it possible to go Sainte-Marie church of Schaerbeek to the Bois of Cambers by borrowing the Royal Rue (Brussels) and the any news Avenue Louise. Ten years later, the city has already a score of lines on rails towards the suburbs, whereas Paris has yet only one of them. It is only towards 1900 that the horses will be gradually replaced by electrical motors. One will meet soon trams in all the districts of the city, including in the narrow and sloping streets of the center. Although, under the pressure of the car, of many lines of Tramway were removed or replaced by Autobus or lines of Métro, the “tram” remains one of the symbols of Brussels. Become again competitive thanks to the courses called “in exclusive right of way” which strongly increases its block speed, it becomes again an economic alternative to the private car, of which the number saturates circulation and with great work with infrastructure of the type Métro.

The museum

Animated by the voluntary ones, the museum of the tram recalls the history of it while presenting more than sixty vehicles going back to 1868 to 1969, since the horse-drawn cars, the Trolley bus, with the famous trams trailer chocolates and cars and food by stem which were disconnected regularly from their cable (“Jef, of flèch is af! ”, “Jef, the arrow fell! ”).

The museum organizes courses in historical trams through the city in direction of the Parc of the Fiftieth anniversary, or in direction of the royal Musée of central Africa of Tervuren through the Forêt of Look after.

The topicality of the museum is published each month in the monthly magazine " Tram 2000 (magazine) ".

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