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>>749
>So when Hamilton or Oshawa city council has the idea to bring back their street railway, they could say hey nice to hear it !! Split the cost, lay down some tracks on a street we will lend you the cars and try it out for a year or two.
>Or trace the old routes of the radial street car lines or old belt lines and put them on their own right of way
There has to be the wow factor of improved service when a new system or a major extension opens. Hand me down rolling stock around 40 of age from the neighbouring municipalities doesn't quite cut it. Especially if the community has the closure of a previous tram system in its memory.
Joe [s]sixpack[/s] carboy: "getting them noisy and slow streetcars back for the darkies and the welfare queens to ride? On my tax dollars?? No thank you!"
Gubment: "we got rid of it once. If we were to rebuilt the streetcar, wouldn't that mean that we, the rulers, are not infallible? Unacceptable!"
There may even be accessibility (I hear it's called "ADA") issues, unless it was a pure heritage service or an extension to existing system with sufficient accessible service retained. Plus, the upfront cost of buying new rolling stock isn't even that pressing issue when all of it is debt anyway; interest payments of new vehicles vs. increased maintenance costs of the old. In any case the real commitment would be made in rebuilding the street infrastructure into 21st century light rail standards. Monetarily too, I recall in Helsinki's new extension the cost of 25 km of rail was 386 M€, 29 new LRVs were 110 M€ and depot was 70 M€.
>>750
Depends. The difference between gauges is just 30mm per side. It could well be these are slightly widened standard gauge bogies and the bearing placement is the same. It could have given UTDC an option to sell these cars to standard gauge systems with no redesign at all. This is pure speculation though, if someone from the same continent as these cars has better knowledge, I stand corrected.
I know many trams in the past have been designed to be convertible between standard and metre gauge with little more than axle and fender change. Also, wheel widths differ somewhat between different systems, depending if they cross points on treads or on flanges.