An example that perhaps Bristol and Bath should follow?

[whole diary]

[grahame]

Yesterday ... my first visit to Chemnitz, travelling through on the hourly train from Aue in Saxony that turned itself into a tram at Technopark, switched from diesel to electric, and combed in with other services to give a more frequent mass transit through the heart of the city and to the main railway station where I left it to continue out on the other side. It's not unique - I have arrived in Saabrucken on a tram that started on a train. And in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom), we have a similar system in Sheffield though I have not travelled on it.   

The idea seems sensible and appears to work well - so why has it not seen wider adoption, and might it work in places like Bristol and Bath, Exeter and Plymouth, Southampton and Swindon?

[WelshBluebird]

We don't even need to look that far. The 398s being introduced in South Wales are based on the same tram-train platform and some of the extensions being done and planned in terms of street running are great examples for showing what you could do.

[grahame]

We don't even need to look that far. The 398s being introduced in South Wales are based on the same tram-train platform and some of the extensions being done and planned in terms of street running are great examples for showing what you could do.

Our speaker at the November 25th 2026  meeting of the West Wiltshire Rail User group will be Nathan Sealey, Head of Practice - Systems Engineering and BIM^▸ (Building Information Modeling)  |  Consulting Rail at Amey, who has had rather a lot  to do with the South Wales Metro.  We may hear some things looking ahead to the Bath and Wiltshire metro too.

Meeting from 19:00 (for networking and coffee) with Nathan talking from 19:30. Paid up members of WWRUG^» (West Wiltshire Rail Users Group - about) - it's included. Guests welcome for £2 on the night (cash only).   At the Bethesda Church Hall, near to Trowbridge station, with a finish time such that it works out well for trains in all sorts of directions even before we have metro frequency!

[stuving]

There are two separate questions here: one about trams per se, on-road in the city centre and segregated outside, and the other about sharing lines with heavy rail. The first has been done, e.g.Croydon (where heavy rail lines were transferred rather than shared) or to a limited extent in other cities. And even in the USA - MAX in Portland, Oregon.

Sharing has been suggested (some time ago - before Sheffield - I forget when) but I recall that the idea fell foul of the issue of "buffing load". I have found little on this on line, or in old newspapers, but I think the standards required railway vehicles to sustain an end load (static?) of 200 tonnes. For trams the requirement was much lower, perhaps 20 tonnes. The Germans must have had a way round this.