Streetcar vs. electric bus wires

[Lee Colleton]

Hello Ethan,

I'm curious to know if there are any conflicts between the wiring for streetcars and electric buses. I don't recall any wired bus routes crossing the South Lake Union Trolley; will the First/Capitol Hill extension impact the wired routes there? Will any wires need to be replaced or taken out of service? How do the maintenance costs of streetcar wires compare to bus wires?

Given the open discussion on the future of electric buses in Seattle, I thought this information would be pertinent.

Kind regards,

Lee Colleton

[Lee Colleton]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Melone, Ethan" <Ethan....@seattle.gov>
Date: Jul 21, 2010 3:48 PM
Subject: Re: Streetcar vs. electric bus wires
To: "l...@colleton.net" <l...@colleton.net>

Lee-

Actually, the South Lake Union line has several crossings of the trolley bus system, at Westlake and Stewart, Virginia; Fairview and Valley, Harrison; and runs parallel on Fairview. I am not surprised you did not notice because the crossings are pretty seamless. For First Hill, there are many crossing points, and we are considering some wireless (battery-drive) segments to further simplify the integration.

With regard to maintenance of the overhead system, this is not a significant operating cost. It is possible that the trolley bus system, which mostly dates from the 70s, has some major maintenance needs.

Thanks for your interst in the First Hill Streetcar project.

________________________________
From: lee.co...@gmail.com <lee.co...@gmail.com>
To: Melone, Ethan
Cc: trumps-...@googlegroups.com <trumps-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Wed Jul 21 15:04:09 2010
Subject: Streetcar vs. electric bus wires