Visit to Tucson

Last week Frank and I and our family were in Arizona for my daughter's wedding, and I had a chance to visit Tucson.  The Old Pueblo Trolley group used to run cars down the middle of the street in a heritage trolley operation.  Part of the line used original streetcar tracks with the paving removed.   Unfortunately, this was stopped when a modern light rail line was constructed along the same route, and the old tracks were removed.  The Old Pueblo is now in a state of suspended animation, at best.

The operating cars are still stored at the old carbarn; there is no longer any connection onto the street.  The shops for the new light rail line are a block away.

These are all foreign cars, so they don't appear in Frank's database.  They are from Belgium, Japan, and Portugal.  Some other equipment is either stored elsewhere or has been scrapped.

 The single trucker appears to be in very good condition, as it's under a roof.

I can remember riding this Japanese car (above) with Frank many years ago.  I think we were sitting on folding chairs.

And this is what the modern cars look like.  Unlike most modern LRV installations, such as Dallas and Phoenix where the cars are almost entirely on a dedicated ROW, the Tucson line is mostly in the middle of the street among unrestricted traffic.   And parts of it are single track.