this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2025
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Trams would have a lower maintenance cost and higher volumes than buses. Buses are ideal for temporary routes and little else. If the provincial government ran trams instead of buses, they could afford to maintain more routes at the same annual cost, provided a little extra initial money. Then it wouldn't be so impossible to have a tram route serving you.
What you're seeing isn't a physical law. It's an engineering problem.
We got rid of trams last century because there were better engineering solutions. Buses got more efficient, larger and more comfortable than they used to. Also within a city metro is much better and faster. They are also electric now. No need for investing in tram infrastructure for most cases nowadays.
Also when talking about rural I don't think if we are talking really about trams, more like low distance trains, at least that's what we call them here. They use full train infrastructure. Trams are more for cities.
What I don't get is why some people cannot be happy with a 70% traffic reduction in cities ? That would be a great objective that would get rid of tons of emissions and problems without that much fuss because it's easy to provide not only the same but better life quality with that objective. But some people feel the need to push to really hard extremes that, imho, only make people to push back over any attempt on traffic reduction. We could do a lot with proper demand control instead of trying to push a lot of restrictions on people and wanting to take away rights and life quality.
First off, the Netherlands brought back their trams, and it's awesome. Trams are the most accessible form of transportation for people with mobility or financial issues, and they contribute very positively to the local economy by increasing foot traffic around local businesses. And as I said, they're cheaper to run and maintain than buses.
Second, a 70% traffic reduction in cities would be around a 50% reduction in car usage overall, which was the thing you started this argument by complaining about. My radicalism caused you to push for a compromise that you previously considered too extreme. Get got. Being radical works.
Netherlands has crazy population density. The whole country is like a big city. Also I remember using a tram in Netherlands in the 2010s I don't know if they really got rid of them.
Anyway buses have a lot of advantages in rural areas. They respond better to a variable demand, they need less infrastructure, you can change routes all you want, you can get rotatory routes without going broke with the infrastructure. A tram would most likely need a bigger population density to be justified. Even then. Modern buses are quite good. Don't get me wrong I love a smooth tram travel and the looks of it, but it is more expensive than a bus. Here buses are 100% accessible for all people, flat floors, and automatic ramps for people with mobility issues.
I've always have been advocating for car reduction. Since forever, I've not changed my ming here. And precisely it's really hard to make people understand that we could achieve better living standards and that they will still be able to use a car when needed when there's people around telling them that they will not be allowed to use a car at all. It makes the struggle for traffic reduction harder.
I think selling the idea of, "you can have a car but we are going to make it so you will only need to use it a couple times a month, because you won't need it more" is way friendlier then "we are going to take away your car".
Also we are talking about countries with massive urban population. In a world context many countries could not adopt this model because they can be 80% rural or more.