Rio de Janeiro Light Rail ( pt, VLT Carioca) is a modern light rail system serving Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The system is among several new public transport developments in the region ahead of the city's successful bid for the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics ( pt, Jogos Olímpicos de Verão de 2016), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad ( pt, Jogos da XXXI Olimpíada) and also known as Rio 2016, was an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 20 ...

. Its official name is , the

initialism An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

"VLT" (which stands for ''veículo leve sobre trilhos'', literally ''Light vehicle on rails'') being equivalent to the English term '' light rail''.

Overview

Rio light rail arriving at Santos Dumont station

The first phase, consisting of a single 15-kilometre line between the Novo Rio Bus Terminal and Santos Dumont Airport and 18

stops Stop may refer to: Places *Stop, Kentucky, an unincorporated community in the United States * Stop (Rogatica), a village in Rogatica, Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina Facilities * Bus stop * Truck stop, a type of rest stop for truck dri ...

, was inaugurated on 5 June 2016, two months ahead of the Olympics opening ceremony, with regular service beginning the following day. For the first month of operation, it was free of charge to ride, but only two trams were in service between noon and 15:00 on the section between Parada dos Museus in Praça Mauá and Santos Dumont Airport."Rio's trams will run for the Olympics: Brazil's wire-free modern tramway opens, part of a major revitalisation project for Rio de Janeiro" (July 2016). '' Tramways & Urban Transit'', p. 244. UK: LRTA Publishing. The remainder of the line was opened and service was expanded to full-time operation on 12 July, although only 16 of the 18 stops on the line are in use. The network uses 32

Alstom Citadis The Alstom Citadis is a family of low-floor trams and light rail vehicles built by Alstom. , over 2,300 Citadis trams have been sold and 1,800 tramways are in revenue service throughout the world, with operations in all six inhabited continents ...

402 low-floor trams carrying 420 passengers each. They are bi-directional, air-conditioned, have seven sections, and eight doors per side. The first five trams were built in

Alstom Alstom SA is a French multinational rolling stock manufacturer operating worldwide in rail transport markets, active in the fields of passenger transportation, signalling, and locomotives, with products including the AGV, TGV, Eurostar, Avelia ...

's facility in La Rochelle, France and shipped to Rio in July 2015, and the remaining 27 were built in Alstom's facility in Taubaté, in the state of São Paulo. There are no

overhead lines An overhead line or overhead wire is an electrical cable that is used to transmit electrical energy to electric locomotives, trolleybuses or trams. It is known variously as: * Overhead catenary * Overhead contact system (OCS) * Overhead equipmen ...

installed along the entire route. Instead, Alstom has equipped approximately 80% of the line with its proprietary ground-level power supply (APS) system. The remaining 20% uses on-board

supercapacitor A supercapacitor (SC), also called an ultracapacitor, is a high-capacity capacitor, with a capacitance value much higher than other capacitors but with lower voltage limits. It bridges the gap between electrolytic capacitors and rechargeable ba ...

-based

energy storage Energy storage is the capture of energy produced at one time for use at a later time to reduce imbalances between energy demand and energy production. A device that stores energy is generally called an accumulator or battery. Energy comes in ...

(SRS), also developed by Alstom. Trams are still equipped with

pantographs A pantograph (, from their original use for copying writing) is a mechanical linkage connected in a manner based on parallelograms so that the movement of one pen, in tracing an image, produces identical movements in a second pen. If a line dr ...

for use in the maintenance facility. The remainder of the three-line, 28-km network will open in stages by the end of 2017. It is estimated that when the entire network is at full capacity, it would be able to eliminate 60% of buses and 15% of automobile traffic circulating in the city centre.

References

External links

VLT Carioca
{{Urban Rail systems in Brazil Public transport in Rio de Janeiro (city) Tram transport in Brazil Railway lines opened in 2016 750 V DC railway electrification

Overview

See also

References

External links