There are around 350 trolleybus systems world-wide. That’s as many as there are street tramways! This fact astounds most people who have never seen a modern trolleybus system, and therefore think they no longer exist. Many of the European systems are to be found in former Eastern Bloc countries.

However, a good many major cities around the world operate trolleybus systems, including Vancouver, San Francisco, Geneva, Lyon, Salzburg, Athens, Beijing and St Petersburg. In many of these places, the trolleybus is the backbone of the public transport system.

New networks are being constructed or proposed all the time – the Italian systems in Lecce and Rome, for example, have been introduced in recent years. More and more, environmentally friendly electric trolleybuses are being acknowledged as an efficient, clean and popular choice for public transport. Many are now built with a small battery that allows operation away from the overhead wires and so increasingly trolleybus systems are being expanded with minimal or no additional overhead required.

Here are some links which show trolleybuses operating in recent years, and also statistics of the spread of systems around the world:

www.worldwide.trolleybus.org.uk

www.tbus.org.uk/systems.htm and www.tbus.org.uk/news.htm

Salzburg Public Transport

Castellón, Spain

Czech Republic – Mariánské Lázn

Members’ Photo websites:

www.flickr.com/photos/trolleyfan/collections/