Trolleybuses in Dayton
Encyclopedia
The Dayton trolleybus
system forms part of the public transportation network serving Dayton
, in the state of Ohio
, United States
. Opened on April 23, 1933, it presently comprises seven lines, and is operated by the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
, with a fleet of 54 trolleybuses – or trolley buses (two words), the common American English
spelling of the term.
One of only five such systems currently operating in the U.S., the Dayton trolley bus system is the current manifestation of an electric transit service that has been operated continuously in Dayton since 1888 — longer than in any other city in the United States. By the 1970s, Dayton was already the smallest U.S. city still operating a trolley bus system. For both of these reasons, the city's trolley buses are locally considered an icon of Dayton.
to trolley coaches — or trolley buses, as they are most commonly known today. Electric streetcar service in Dayton had started in 1888, and it continued through to, and indeed beyond, the start of trolley bus service. The last streetcar line in Dayton, City Railway's route 1-Third Street, was converted to trolley buses on September 28, 1947. Today, and already the case by the 1980s, Dayton's trolley bus system is the second-oldest in the Western Hemisphere
(which in 2011 totals 18 systems), exceeded in longevity only by the Philadelphia trolley bus system
, which opened on October 14, 1923.
The first trolley bus line in Dayton was opened by the Dayton Street Railway company (DSR). The impetus for the decision to adopt trolley buses was a 1932 fire at the company's carbarn (maintenance and storage facility), which gutted the building and destroyed 16 streetcars and two gas
buses. After studying trolley coach systems then operating in other small cities, DSR placed an order with the J. G. Brill Company for 12 trolley buses, and these inaugurated service on the city's first ETB line in April 1933. However, the Dayton Street Railway was only the first of several companies to operate trolley bus service in Dayton, some of which operated concurrently and shared overhead wires
on some sections, mainly in downtown
.
In the late 19th century, it was common in the United States for cities to be served by multiple different streetcar companies, each company typically operating a few lines. However, via mergers, acquisitions and sometimes bankruptcy the number of operating companies gradually declined to just one or two in each city. By 1930, most U.S. cities had just one company providing all urban transit service. Dayton was unusual in having multiple transit companies in operation through to the World War II era. In 1933, when the first trolley bus service began operating, Dayton still had five separate streetcar companies providing urban service, and all five eventually converted some or all of their routes to trolley buses, over the period 1933–40; these are the first five companies listed in the table below. As late as the 1960s, transit service in Dayton was provided "almost exclusively by trolley coaches".
The table below lists all of Dayton's trolley bus operators since the introduction of the mode in 1933.
For a period of about seven months starting in October 1940, Dayton had five independently owned and operated trolley bus systems, and it was the only city in the world ever to possess that many independent trolley bus systems concurrently.
After 1955, all public transit in Dayton was operated by the City Transit Company. The transit system was transferred from private to public ownership on November 5, 1972, when the newly formed (in 1971) Miami Valley Regional Transit Authority
(MVRTA) took over the City Transit Company's system. MVRTA changed its name to the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
(GDRTA) around May 2002. The name is commonly shortened simply to RTA.
The RTA voted to continue trolley bus operation, and in the mid-1970s replaced the aging fleet of Marmon-Herrington
trolley buses with 64 Flyer
E800 units, delivered in 1977.
In the late 1980s, the Dayton trolley bus system was headed towards closure. The RTA Board of Trustees voted in 1988 to phase out trolley bus operation, but this decision was reversed in 1991, after a consultant's study report indicated that retaining trolley bus service was the most cost-effective option over the long term, as well as having environmental benefits. Following this decision, RTA began refurbishing some of its Flyer trolley buses, to ensure they would continue to operate reliably until a fleet of new trolley buses could be purchased and put into service, in a few years' time.
Over the period 1996–99, the Flyer E800s were replaced by a new fleet of 57 vehicles built by Electric Transit, Inc.
(ETI), based on an existing model of the Czech
company Skoda
(and partially built by Skoda), with final assembly taking place in Dayton. ETI was a joint venture
owned 65% by Skoda and 35% by the U.S. company, AAI Corporation
.
; such routes are sometimes referred to as two routes, e.g. as 1E and 1W, or as "5-north" and "5-south".) Trolley buses normally provide all of the service on routes 4, 5, 7 and 8, except when service is temporarily disrupted by major road construction, but routes 1, 2 and 3 only use trolleys on a few trips in the weekday rush hour
and are otherwise served by diesel or hybrid
buses. Following a systemwide RTA service restructuring implemented in January 2007, route 5 has only one round trip in each peak period, most of its previous service having been taken over by a parallel diesel bus route.
and Marmon-Herrington
. Most of these were newly built vehicles, but between 1956 and 1965 the City Transit Company made several purchases of used trolley buses from other cities, acquiring 21 Brills from Little Rock, Arkansas
, and Indianapolis, Indiana
; and 75 Marmon-Herringtons from four cities: Little Rock; Cincinnati, Ohio
; Columbus, Ohio
and Kansas City, Missouri
. By the end of the 1960s, the system's last Brill trolley buses had been retired, as had most of the Pullmans, but a few of latter remained in use into the period of RTA ownership, being stored in 1973 and eventually scrapped. Marmon-Herrington trolleybuses thereby comprised almost the entire fleet at the time of transfer of the system to public ownership in 1972.
A notable purchase of a single trolley bus occurred in 1971, when the City Transit Company purchased a model E700A trolley bus from Western Flyer Coach (now known as New Flyer Industries
). It was the first new trolley coach purchased by any U.S. transit system since 1955. Numbered 900, its electric motors and control equipment were taken from two of CT's retired Brill trolley buses, but all else was new, and the vehicle was widely considered to be a new trolley bus. The MVRTA was formed in 1971, and in late 1972 purchased the entire City Transit system, including its fleet of vehicles. In 1974, Flyer discontinued its model E700, replacing it with model E800.
MVRTA placed an order for 64 Flyer E800 trolley buses in January 1975. The first two were delivered in late 1976 and the remainder in 1977. They were the city's first air-conditioned
trolley buses. Wheelchair lift
s were retrofitted to them in 1983. The last Marmon-Herrington trolley buses were withdrawn from service in October 1982. Flyer trolley buses then comprised the entire fleet (for normal service) until the mid-1990s. RTA acquired two 1981–82 Brown-Boveri
-built, GM "New Look"-body trolley buses from the Edmonton Transit System
, in Canada, in 1995, retrofitted wheelchair lifts to them, and placed them in service in 1996.
Anticipating retiring its 1976–77 Flyers at about 20 years of age, RTA began considering options for purchasing new vehicles, and in 1994 the agency placed an order with Electric Transit, Inc.
for 63 new trolley buses. The order was later reduced to 61 vehicles, and ultimately to 57. Between 1996 and 1999, these replaced all of the Flyer buses. The two ex-Edmonton vehicles, which were not air-conditioned, were both withdrawn from service by mid-2002.
The suffix E in the ETI model numbers stands for "export", as the 14TrE model was Skoda's first 14Tr model designed for the North American market, which market had requirements that had not applied in Europe, including that wheelchair lift
s be included. At the time (and for many years prior), Skoda was one of the largest manufacturers of trolley buses in the world and it had been producing variations of its model 14Tr since 1974, making about 3,350 of that model by 1999. Dayton's three 14TrE prototypes were built in 1995 and delivered to RTA in late December 1995 and January 1996. This series is not presently in service.
The suffix E2 denotes the production series of the export model, which incorporated several changes adopted after testing of the three prototypes, in particular relocation of the wheelchair lift from the rear door to the front door and, necessitated by that change, widening of the body. The single-pane windshield was replaced by a two-piece one, and the rear window was made smaller. The length of the 57 ETI vehicles is 37 in 8 in (11.48 m), slightly shorter than the 40 feet (12.2 m) standard length for U.S. transit bus
es. The width was 98.4 inches (2.5 m) for the three prototypes, but was increased to 102 inches (2.6 m) (the standard transit bus width in the U.S.) for the 54 production-series units.
in southern Dayton. The Illinois Railway Museum
's collection includes ex-Dayton (City Transit) Pullman trolley bus 435 and two ex-Dayton Flyer E800s, Nos. 906 and 925. Additional historic ex-Dayton trolley buses have been saved by others.
Trolleybus
A trolleybus is an electric bus that draws its electricity from overhead wires using spring-loaded trolley poles. Two wires and poles are required to complete the electrical circuit...
system forms part of the public transportation network serving Dayton
Dayton
Dayton is a city in Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County, Ohio, United States.Dayton may also refer to:-United States:*Dayton, Alabama*Dayton, California, in Butte County*Dayton, Lassen County, California*Dayton, Idaho*Dayton, Indiana...
, in the state of Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Opened on April 23, 1933, it presently comprises seven lines, and is operated by the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
The Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority, formerly known as the Miami Valley RTA, is a public transit agency that generally serves the greater Dayton, Ohio area. The GDRTA serves communities within Montgomery County and parts of Greene County, Ohio, USA. There are 29 routes...
, with a fleet of 54 trolleybuses – or trolley buses (two words), the common American English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
spelling of the term.
One of only five such systems currently operating in the U.S., the Dayton trolley bus system is the current manifestation of an electric transit service that has been operated continuously in Dayton since 1888 — longer than in any other city in the United States. By the 1970s, Dayton was already the smallest U.S. city still operating a trolley bus system. For both of these reasons, the city's trolley buses are locally considered an icon of Dayton.
History
The first electric trolley bus (ETB) service in Ohio began operation in Dayton, on April 23, 1933, when the Salem Avenue-Lorain Avenue line was converted from streetcarsTram
A tram is a passenger rail vehicle which runs on tracks along public urban streets and also sometimes on separate rights of way. It may also run between cities and/or towns , and/or partially grade separated even in the cities...
to trolley coaches — or trolley buses, as they are most commonly known today. Electric streetcar service in Dayton had started in 1888, and it continued through to, and indeed beyond, the start of trolley bus service. The last streetcar line in Dayton, City Railway's route 1-Third Street, was converted to trolley buses on September 28, 1947. Today, and already the case by the 1980s, Dayton's trolley bus system is the second-oldest in the Western Hemisphere
Western Hemisphere
The Western Hemisphere or western hemisphere is mainly used as a geographical term for the half of the Earth that lies west of the Prime Meridian and east of the Antimeridian , the other half being called the Eastern Hemisphere.In this sense, the western hemisphere consists of the western portions...
(which in 2011 totals 18 systems), exceeded in longevity only by the Philadelphia trolley bus system
Trolleybuses in Philadelphia
The Philadelphia trolleybus system, or trackless trolley system as it is known by its operator, forms part of the public transportation network serving Philadelphia, in the state of Pennsylvania, United States. It opened on October 14, 1923, and is now is the second-longest-lived trolleybus...
, which opened on October 14, 1923.
The first trolley bus line in Dayton was opened by the Dayton Street Railway company (DSR). The impetus for the decision to adopt trolley buses was a 1932 fire at the company's carbarn (maintenance and storage facility), which gutted the building and destroyed 16 streetcars and two gas
Gasoline
Gasoline , or petrol , is a toxic, translucent, petroleum-derived liquid that is primarily used as a fuel in internal combustion engines. It consists mostly of organic compounds obtained by the fractional distillation of petroleum, enhanced with a variety of additives. Some gasolines also contain...
buses. After studying trolley coach systems then operating in other small cities, DSR placed an order with the J. G. Brill Company for 12 trolley buses, and these inaugurated service on the city's first ETB line in April 1933. However, the Dayton Street Railway was only the first of several companies to operate trolley bus service in Dayton, some of which operated concurrently and shared overhead wires
Overhead lines
Overhead lines or overhead wires are used to transmit electrical energy to trams, trolleybuses or trains at a distance from the energy supply point...
on some sections, mainly in downtown
Downtown Dayton
Downtown Dayton is the central business district of Dayton, Ohio. Major reinvestment in the downtown area began heavily in the mid-1990s, and continues today with $2 billion in residential, commercial, health, and transportation developments that has or is taking place in the downtown area...
.
In the late 19th century, it was common in the United States for cities to be served by multiple different streetcar companies, each company typically operating a few lines. However, via mergers, acquisitions and sometimes bankruptcy the number of operating companies gradually declined to just one or two in each city. By 1930, most U.S. cities had just one company providing all urban transit service. Dayton was unusual in having multiple transit companies in operation through to the World War II era. In 1933, when the first trolley bus service began operating, Dayton still had five separate streetcar companies providing urban service, and all five eventually converted some or all of their routes to trolley buses, over the period 1933–40; these are the first five companies listed in the table below. As late as the 1960s, transit service in Dayton was provided "almost exclusively by trolley coaches".
The table below lists all of Dayton's trolley bus operators since the introduction of the mode in 1933.
| Name | From | To | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dayton Street Railway Company | April 23, 1933 | April 28, 1941 | Renamed Dayton Street Transit Co. circa 1935. Acquired by City Railway Company in 1941. |
| Oakwood Street Railway Co. (OSR) | January 19, 1936 | October 1, 1956 | Acquired by City Railway Company. |
| Peoples Railway Co. (PR) | October 11, 1936 | March 9, 1945 | Acquired by City Railway Company. |
| City Railway Co. (CR) | March 25, 1938 | October 31, 1955 | Merged with Dayton-Xenia Railway Co. to form City Transit Company. |
| Dayton-Xenia Railway Co. (DXR) | October 1, 1940 | October 31, 1955 | The last newly built system to open. Merged with City Railway Co. to form City Transit Company. |
| City Transit Company (CT) | November 1, 1955 | November 4, 1972 | Formed by merger of CR with DXR, not new construction. Taken over in 1972 by new public authority, the Miami Valley Regional Transit Authority. |
| Miami Valley Regional Transit Authority (now Greater Dayton RTA Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority The Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority, formerly known as the Miami Valley RTA, is a public transit agency that generally serves the greater Dayton, Ohio area. The GDRTA serves communities within Montgomery County and parts of Greene County, Ohio, USA. There are 29 routes... ) |
November 5, 1972 | present | Current operator of the system, renamed from MVRTA to GDRTA in 2002. |
For a period of about seven months starting in October 1940, Dayton had five independently owned and operated trolley bus systems, and it was the only city in the world ever to possess that many independent trolley bus systems concurrently.
After 1955, all public transit in Dayton was operated by the City Transit Company. The transit system was transferred from private to public ownership on November 5, 1972, when the newly formed (in 1971) Miami Valley Regional Transit Authority
Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
The Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority, formerly known as the Miami Valley RTA, is a public transit agency that generally serves the greater Dayton, Ohio area. The GDRTA serves communities within Montgomery County and parts of Greene County, Ohio, USA. There are 29 routes...
(MVRTA) took over the City Transit Company's system. MVRTA changed its name to the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority
The Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority, formerly known as the Miami Valley RTA, is a public transit agency that generally serves the greater Dayton, Ohio area. The GDRTA serves communities within Montgomery County and parts of Greene County, Ohio, USA. There are 29 routes...
(GDRTA) around May 2002. The name is commonly shortened simply to RTA.
The RTA voted to continue trolley bus operation, and in the mid-1970s replaced the aging fleet of Marmon-Herrington
Marmon-Herrington
The Marmon-Herrington Company, Inc. is an American-based manufacturer of axles and transfer cases for trucks and other vehicles. Earlier, the company built military vehicles and some tanks during World War II, and until the late 1950s or early 1960s was a manufacturer of trucks and trolley buses...
trolley buses with 64 Flyer
New Flyer Industries
New Flyer Industries Inc. is a bus manufacturer in North America, headquartered in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. It also has factories in Crookston and St. Cloud, Minnesota, USA.-History:...
E800 units, delivered in 1977.
In the late 1980s, the Dayton trolley bus system was headed towards closure. The RTA Board of Trustees voted in 1988 to phase out trolley bus operation, but this decision was reversed in 1991, after a consultant's study report indicated that retaining trolley bus service was the most cost-effective option over the long term, as well as having environmental benefits. Following this decision, RTA began refurbishing some of its Flyer trolley buses, to ensure they would continue to operate reliably until a fleet of new trolley buses could be purchased and put into service, in a few years' time.
Over the period 1996–99, the Flyer E800s were replaced by a new fleet of 57 vehicles built by Electric Transit, Inc.
Electric Transit, Inc.
Electric Transit, Inc. was a joint venture between the Škoda group in the Czech Republic and AAI Corporation in the United States which made trolleybuses for the Dayton and San Francisco trolleybus systems, constructing a total of 330 trolleybuses. ETI was formed in 1994, and ownership was divided...
(ETI), based on an existing model of the Czech
Czech Republic
The Czech Republic is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Poland to the northeast, Slovakia to the east, Austria to the south, and Germany to the west and northwest....
company Skoda
Škoda Works
Škoda Works was the largest industrial enterprise in Austro-Hungary and later in Czechoslovakia, one of its successor states. It was also one of the largest industrial conglomerates in Europe in the 20th century...
(and partially built by Skoda), with final assembly taking place in Dayton. ETI was a joint venture
Joint venture
A joint venture is a business agreement in which parties agree to develop, for a finite time, a new entity and new assets by contributing equity. They exercise control over the enterprise and consequently share revenues, expenses and assets...
owned 65% by Skoda and 35% by the U.S. company, AAI Corporation
AAI Corporation
AAI Corporation is an aerospace and defense development and manufacturing firm in Hunt Valley, Maryland, USA. It is formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of United Industrial Corporation, AAI was acquired by Textron in 2007 and currently is an operating unit of Textron Systems Corporation...
.
Current routes
Trolley buses currently operate on seven RTA routes. Since 1988, it has been the same seven routes, but with some changes made to the routings or service levels. These are routes 1-East Third Street/West Third Street, 2-Lexington/East 5th Street, 3-Wayne Avenue, 4-Hoover/Xenia-Linden, 5-Valley Street/Far Hills, 7-North Main/Watervliet, and 8-Salem/Lakeview. (A slash here indicates a route that runs in two different directions from downtown DaytonDowntown Dayton
Downtown Dayton is the central business district of Dayton, Ohio. Major reinvestment in the downtown area began heavily in the mid-1990s, and continues today with $2 billion in residential, commercial, health, and transportation developments that has or is taking place in the downtown area...
; such routes are sometimes referred to as two routes, e.g. as 1E and 1W, or as "5-north" and "5-south".) Trolley buses normally provide all of the service on routes 4, 5, 7 and 8, except when service is temporarily disrupted by major road construction, but routes 1, 2 and 3 only use trolleys on a few trips in the weekday rush hour
Rush hour
A rush hour or peak hour is a part of the day during which traffic congestion on roads and crowding on public transport is at its highest. Normally, this happens twice a day—once in the morning and once in the evening, the times during when the most people commute...
and are otherwise served by diesel or hybrid
Hybrid electric bus
A hybrid electric bus combines a conventional internal combustion engine propulsion system with an electric propulsion system. These type of buses normally use a diesel-electric powertrain and are also known as hybrid diesel-electric buses....
buses. Following a systemwide RTA service restructuring implemented in January 2007, route 5 has only one round trip in each peak period, most of its previous service having been taken over by a parallel diesel bus route.
Past fleet
Dayton's first trolley buses were supplied by the J. G. Brill Company, in 1933. Vehicles purchased later included additional Brills, along with ETBs built by Pullman-StandardPullman Company
The Pullman Palace Car Company, founded by George Pullman, manufactured railroad cars in the mid-to-late 19th century through the early decades of the 20th century, during the boom of railroads in the United States. Pullman developed the sleeping car which carried his name into the 1980s...
and Marmon-Herrington
Marmon-Herrington
The Marmon-Herrington Company, Inc. is an American-based manufacturer of axles and transfer cases for trucks and other vehicles. Earlier, the company built military vehicles and some tanks during World War II, and until the late 1950s or early 1960s was a manufacturer of trucks and trolley buses...
. Most of these were newly built vehicles, but between 1956 and 1965 the City Transit Company made several purchases of used trolley buses from other cities, acquiring 21 Brills from Little Rock, Arkansas
Little Rock, Arkansas
Little Rock is the capital and the largest city of the U.S. state of Arkansas. The Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 699,757 people in the 2010 census...
, and Indianapolis, Indiana
Indianapolis, Indiana
Indianapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Indiana, and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population is 839,489. It is by far Indiana's largest city and, as of the 2010 U.S...
; and 75 Marmon-Herringtons from four cities: Little Rock; Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. Cincinnati is the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located to north of the Ohio River at the Ohio-Kentucky border, near Indiana. The population within city limits is 296,943 according to the 2010 census, making it Ohio's...
; Columbus, Ohio
Columbus, Ohio
Columbus is the capital of and the largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio. The broader metropolitan area encompasses several counties and is the third largest in Ohio behind those of Cleveland and Cincinnati. Columbus is the third largest city in the American Midwest, and the fifteenth largest city...
and Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...
. By the end of the 1960s, the system's last Brill trolley buses had been retired, as had most of the Pullmans, but a few of latter remained in use into the period of RTA ownership, being stored in 1973 and eventually scrapped. Marmon-Herrington trolleybuses thereby comprised almost the entire fleet at the time of transfer of the system to public ownership in 1972.
A notable purchase of a single trolley bus occurred in 1971, when the City Transit Company purchased a model E700A trolley bus from Western Flyer Coach (now known as New Flyer Industries
New Flyer Industries
New Flyer Industries Inc. is a bus manufacturer in North America, headquartered in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. It also has factories in Crookston and St. Cloud, Minnesota, USA.-History:...
). It was the first new trolley coach purchased by any U.S. transit system since 1955. Numbered 900, its electric motors and control equipment were taken from two of CT's retired Brill trolley buses, but all else was new, and the vehicle was widely considered to be a new trolley bus. The MVRTA was formed in 1971, and in late 1972 purchased the entire City Transit system, including its fleet of vehicles. In 1974, Flyer discontinued its model E700, replacing it with model E800.
MVRTA placed an order for 64 Flyer E800 trolley buses in January 1975. The first two were delivered in late 1976 and the remainder in 1977. They were the city's first air-conditioned
Air conditioning
An air conditioner is a home appliance, system, or mechanism designed to dehumidify and extract heat from an area. The cooling is done using a simple refrigeration cycle...
trolley buses. Wheelchair lift
Wheelchair lift
A wheelchair lift, also known as a platform lift, is a powered device designed to raise a wheelchair and its occupant in order to overcome a step or similar vertical barrier....
s were retrofitted to them in 1983. The last Marmon-Herrington trolley buses were withdrawn from service in October 1982. Flyer trolley buses then comprised the entire fleet (for normal service) until the mid-1990s. RTA acquired two 1981–82 Brown-Boveri
Brown, Boveri & Cie
Brown, Boveri & Cie was a Swiss group of electrical engineering companies.It was founded in Baden, Switzerland, in 1891 by Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown and Walter Boveri who worked at the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon. In 1970 BBC took over the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon...
-built, GM "New Look"-body trolley buses from the Edmonton Transit System
Edmonton Transit System
The Edmonton Transit System, also called ETS, is the public transit service owned and operated by the city of Edmonton, Alberta. It operates Edmonton's bus and light rail systems.-Service:...
, in Canada, in 1995, retrofitted wheelchair lifts to them, and placed them in service in 1996.
Anticipating retiring its 1976–77 Flyers at about 20 years of age, RTA began considering options for purchasing new vehicles, and in 1994 the agency placed an order with Electric Transit, Inc.
Electric Transit, Inc.
Electric Transit, Inc. was a joint venture between the Škoda group in the Czech Republic and AAI Corporation in the United States which made trolleybuses for the Dayton and San Francisco trolleybus systems, constructing a total of 330 trolleybuses. ETI was formed in 1994, and ownership was divided...
for 63 new trolley buses. The order was later reduced to 61 vehicles, and ultimately to 57. Between 1996 and 1999, these replaced all of the Flyer buses. The two ex-Edmonton vehicles, which were not air-conditioned, were both withdrawn from service by mid-2002.
Current fleet
The present Dayton trolley bus fleet comprises two series of the same type of conventional-configuration (two-axle) trolleybus:| Fleet numbers | Quantity | Manufacturer | Electrical equipment |
Model No. | Configuration | Year built |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9601–9603 | 3 | Electric Transit, Inc. Electric Transit, Inc. Electric Transit, Inc. was a joint venture between the Škoda group in the Czech Republic and AAI Corporation in the United States which made trolleybuses for the Dayton and San Francisco trolleybus systems, constructing a total of 330 trolleybuses. ETI was formed in 1994, and ownership was divided... (ETI) (Skoda Škoda Works Škoda Works was the largest industrial enterprise in Austro-Hungary and later in Czechoslovakia, one of its successor states. It was also one of the largest industrial conglomerates in Europe in the 20th century... /AAI Corp. AAI Corporation AAI Corporation is an aerospace and defense development and manufacturing firm in Hunt Valley, Maryland, USA. It is formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of United Industrial Corporation, AAI was acquired by Textron in 2007 and currently is an operating unit of Textron Systems Corporation... ) |
Vossloh Kiepe Vossloh Kiepe Vossloh Kiepe is a German manufacturer of electrical traction equipment for trams, trolleybuses and other transport vehicles, as well as air-conditioning and heating systems, and conveyor device components.-History:... |
14TrE | Standard (two-axle) | 1995 |
| 9801–9854 | 54 | ETI (Skoda/AAI Corp.) | Vossloh Kiepe | 14TrE2 | Standard (two-axle) | 1998–99 |
The suffix E in the ETI model numbers stands for "export", as the 14TrE model was Skoda's first 14Tr model designed for the North American market, which market had requirements that had not applied in Europe, including that wheelchair lift
Wheelchair lift
A wheelchair lift, also known as a platform lift, is a powered device designed to raise a wheelchair and its occupant in order to overcome a step or similar vertical barrier....
s be included. At the time (and for many years prior), Skoda was one of the largest manufacturers of trolley buses in the world and it had been producing variations of its model 14Tr since 1974, making about 3,350 of that model by 1999. Dayton's three 14TrE prototypes were built in 1995 and delivered to RTA in late December 1995 and January 1996. This series is not presently in service.
The suffix E2 denotes the production series of the export model, which incorporated several changes adopted after testing of the three prototypes, in particular relocation of the wheelchair lift from the rear door to the front door and, necessitated by that change, widening of the body. The single-pane windshield was replaced by a two-piece one, and the rear window was made smaller. The length of the 57 ETI vehicles is 37 in 8 in (11.48 m), slightly shorter than the 40 feet (12.2 m) standard length for U.S. transit bus
Transit bus
A transit bus , also known as a commuter bus, city bus, or public bus, is a bus used for short-distance public transport purposes...
es. The width was 98.4 inches (2.5 m) for the three prototypes, but was increased to 102 inches (2.6 m) (the standard transit bus width in the U.S.) for the 54 production-series units.
Preserved trolley buses
Several retired Dayton trolley buses have been saved for historical preservation, including at public museums. Unique 1971 Flyer E700A No. 900 has been preserved by RTA, but is not available for public viewing. 1949 Marmon-Herrington-built trolley bus 515 was kept in operating condition by RTA as a historic vehicle, and between 1984 and 1987 it operated occasional special-event trips on the system; since 1988, it has been on static display at the Carillon Historical ParkCarillon Historical Park
Carillon Historical Park is a 65-acre park and museum in Dayton, Ohio, which contains historic buildings and exhibits concerning the history of technology and the history of Dayton and its residents from 1796 to the present. The historical elements of the park were the brainchild of Colonel...
in southern Dayton. The Illinois Railway Museum
Illinois Railway Museum
The Illinois Railway Museum is the largest railroad museum in the United States and is located in Union, Illinois, northwest of Chicago...
's collection includes ex-Dayton (City Transit) Pullman trolley bus 435 and two ex-Dayton Flyer E800s, Nos. 906 and 925. Additional historic ex-Dayton trolley buses have been saved by others.
External links
- Older Dayton trolley bus photos advertisements and articles
- More recent photos of the Dayton trolley bus system