An elevated railway or elevated train (also known as an el train for short) is a rapid transit railway with the

track Track or Tracks may refer to: Routes or imprints * Ancient trackway, any track or trail whose origin is lost in antiquity * Animal track, imprints left on surfaces that an animal walks across * Desire path, a line worn by people taking the shorte ...

s above street level on a

viaduct A viaduct is a specific type of bridge that consists of a series of arches, piers or columns supporting a long elevated railway or road. Typically a viaduct connects two points of roughly equal elevation, allowing direct overpass across a wide v ...

or other elevated structure (usually constructed from steel, cast iron, concrete, or bricks). The railway may be broad-gauge, standard-gauge or narrow-gauge railway, light rail, monorail, or a suspension railway. Elevated railways are normally found in urban areas where there would otherwise be multiple level crossings. Usually, the tracks of elevated railways that run on steel viaducts can be seen from street level.

History

The earliest elevated railway was the London and Greenwich Railway on a brick viaduct of 878 arches, built between 1836 and 1838. The first of the London and Blackwall Railway (1840) was also built on a viaduct. During the 1840s there were other plans for elevated railways in London that never came to fruition. From the late 1860s onward, elevated railways became popular in US cities. The New York

West Side and Yonkers Patent Railway The IRT Ninth Avenue Line, often called the Ninth Avenue Elevated or Ninth Avenue El, was the first elevated railway in New York City. It opened on July 3, 1868 as the West Side and Yonkers Patent Railway, as an experimental single-track cable ...

operated with

cable car Cable car most commonly refers to the following cable transportation systems: * Aerial lift, such as aerial tramways and gondola lifts, in which the vehicle is suspended in the air from a cable ** Aerial tramway ** Chairlift ** Gondola lift *** Bi ...

s from 1868 to 1870, thereafter locomotive-hauled. This was followed by the Manhattan Railway Company in 1875, the South Side Elevated Railroad, Chicago (1892–), and the elevated lines of the Boston Elevated Railway (1901–). The Chicago transit system itself is known as the "L", short for "elevated". The Berlin Stadtbahn (1882) and the Vienna Stadtbahn (1898) are also mainly elevated. The first electric elevated railway was the Liverpool Overhead Railway, which operated through Liverpool docks from 1893 until 1956. In London, the Docklands Light Railway is a modern elevated railway that opened in 1987 and, since, has expanded. The trains are driverless and automatic. Another modern elevated railway is Tokyo's driverless Yurikamome line, opened in 1995.New Transit Yurikamome websit
History
Retrieved 3 March 2015

Systems

Monorail systems

Most monorails are elevated railways, such as the Disneyland Monorail System (1959), the Tokyo Monorail (1964), the

Sydney Monorail The Sydney Monorail (originally TNT Harbourlink and later Metro Monorail) was a single-loop monorail in Sydney, Australia, that connected Darling Harbour, Chinatown and the Sydney central business and shopping districts. It opened in July 1988 ...

(1988–2013), the KL Monorail, the Las Vegas Monorail, the Seattle Center Monorail and the São Paulo Monorail. Many maglev railways are also elevated.

Suspension railways

During the 1890s there was some interest in suspension railways, particularly in Germany, with the

Schwebebahn Dresden The Dresden Suspension Railway (german: Schwebebahn Dresden) is a suspended funicular located in Dresden, Germany, and connects the districts of Loschwitz and Oberloschwitz (Rochwitz side). It is one of the oldest suspension railways, having ...

, (1891–) and the Wuppertal Schwebebahn (1901).

H-Bahn The H-Bahn (abbreviation for , German for 'hanging railway') in Dortmund and Düsseldorf (there known as "Sky train") is a driverless passenger suspension railway system. The system was developed by Siemens, who call the project SIPEM (SIemens ...

suspension railways were built in

Dortmund Dortmund (; Westphalian nds, Düörpm ; la, Tremonia) is the third-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia after Cologne and Düsseldorf, and the eighth-largest city of Germany, with a population of 588,250 inhabitants as of 2021. It is the la ...

and Düsseldorf airport, 1975. The

Memphis Suspension Railway The Memphis Suspension Railway or Mud Island Monorail is a suspended monorail that connects the city center of Memphis with the entertainment park on Mud Island. Celebrating its grand opening on July 3, 1982, it is located beneath a footbridge ove ...

opened in 1982. Suspension railways are usually monorail;

Shonan Monorail The is a Suspension railway, suspended SAFEGE monorail in the cities of Kamakura, Kanagawa, Kamakura and Fujisawa, Kanagawa, Fujisawa in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. It is operated by the which belongs to Michinori Holdings, and opened on March ...

and

Chiba Urban Monorail The is a two-line suspended monorail system located in Chiba, Chiba Prefecture, Japan. It is owned and operated by , a so-called " third-sector" company established on March 20, 1979. Investors include the city of Chiba. The first segment ...

in Japan, despite their names, are suspension railways.

People mover systems

People mover or automated people mover (APM) is a type of driverless grade-separated, mass-transit system. The term is generally used only to describe systems that serve as loops or feeder systems, but is sometimes applied to considerably more complex automated systems. Similar to monorails,

Bombardier Innovia APM Innovia APM is a rubber-tired automated people mover system (APM) currently manufactured and marketed by Alstom as part of its Innovia series of fully automated transportation systems. The technology was introduced in 1963 by Westinghouse and ...

technology uses only one rail to guide the vehicle along the guideway. APMs are common at airports and effective at helping passengers quickly reach their gates. Several elevated APM systems at airports including the

PHX Sky Train Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport is a civil–military public airport east of downtown Phoenix, in Maricopa County, Arizona, United States. It is Arizona's largest and busiest airport, and among the largest commercial airports in th ...

at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport; AeroTrain at Kuala Lumpur International Airport; and the Tracked Shuttle System at

London Gatwick Airport Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after Hea ...

, United Kingdom.

Modern systems

Full metro system

Roosevelt-avenue-queens-nyc cars driving-under-elevated-railway-line 1980s

;Americas *

Baltimore Metro The Metro SubwayLink is a rapid transit line serving the greater area of Baltimore, Maryland, in the United States, and is operated by the Maryland Transit Administration. The segment in Downtown Baltimore is underground, and most of the line outs ...

(west of Mondawmin) * BART (partial) *

Chicago "L" The Chicago "L" (short for "elevated") is the rapid transit system serving the city of Chicago and some of its surrounding suburbs in the U.S. state of Illinois. Operated by the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), it is the fourth-largest rapid tr ...

(except for parts of the Red Line and Blue Line) * Cleveland Red Line (partial) * Guadalajara light rail system Line 3 (partial under construction) * Honolulu Rail Transit (under construction light metro) *

MARTA Marta may refer to: People * Marta (given name), a feminine given name * Märta, a feminine given name * Marta (surname) :István Márta composer * Marta (footballer) (born 1986), Brazilian professional footballer Places * Marta (river), an ...

(partial) * Medellín Metro * Mexico City Metro (partial) *

Miami Metrorail Metrorail is the heavy rail rapid transit system of Miami and Miami-Dade County in the U.S. state of Florida. Metrorail is operated by Miami-Dade Transit (MDT), a departmental agency of Miami-Dade County. Opened in 1984, it is Florida's only ra ...

New York City Subway The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the government of New York City and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, an affiliate agency of the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Opened on October 2 ...

(partial) * Market–Frankford Line (underground in downtown Philadelphia and West Philadelphia up to 40th Street Station but elevated elsewhere) * PATCO (partial) * PATH (partial) * Line 3 Scarborough, a medium capacity metro rail line in Toronto, Ontario, Canada * SkyTrain, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. *

Washington Metro The Washington Metro (or simply Metro), formally the Metrorail,Google Books search/preview

(partial) * Santiago Metro (partial) *

Lima Metro The Lima Metro ( es, Metro de Lima) is a rapid transit system that serves the area of the cities of Lima and Callao, both of which make up the Lima metropolitan area, currently linking the district of Villa El Salvador in the south of Lima wi ...

(partial) ;Asia *

Bangalore metro Namma Metro ("Our Metro" in Kannada), also known as Bengaluru Metro, is a rapid transit system serving the city of Bengaluru, India. Upon its inauguration, it became the first underground metro system in South India. Namma Metro has a mix of un ...

* Chennai Metro (partial) * Chennai Mass Rapid Transit System * Delhi Metro ( Yellow Line)(

Green Line Green Line may refer to: Places Military and political * Green Line (France), the German occupation line in France during World War II * Green Line (Israel), the 1949 armistice line established between Israel and its neighbours ** City Line ( ...

),( Red Line) *

Hanoi Metro The Hanoi Metro ( vi, Đường sắt đô thị Hà Nội, lit=Hanoi urban railway) is a rapid transit system in Hanoi, the capital city of Vietnam. It is Vietnam's first rapid transit system. It is operated by Hanoi Metro Company (HMC). The fi ...

* Hyderabad Metro * Kochi Metro * Kolkata Metro (future line 5 & 6, later is under construction) * Lahore Metro ( Orange Line) * Manila Light Rail Transit System * Mumbai Metro * Mumbai Monorail *

Nagpur Metro Nagpur Metro is a rapid transit system for the city of Nagpur, Maharashtra, India. It is estimated to cost . In February 2014, the Government of Maharashtra gave approval for the Metro Project, while the Government of India's Ministry of Urban ...

* Rapid Metro Gurgaon * Rapid Rail, the operator of the rapid transit (metro) system serving Kuala Lumpur and the

Klang Valley Klang Valley ( ms, Lembah Klang; zh, 巴生谷; ) is an urban conglomeration in Malaysia that is centered in the federal territories of Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya, and includes its adjoining cities and towns in the state of Selangor. It is con ...

area in Malaysia. *

BTS Skytrain The Bangkok Mass Transit System, commonly known as the BTS Skytrain ( th, รถไฟฟ้าบีทีเอส '' TS'), is an elevated rapid transit system in Bangkok, Thailand. It is operated by Bangkok Mass Transit System PCL (BTSC), a ...

, two elevated rapid transit lines in Bangkok, Thailand *

Wenhu line The Wenhu or Brown line (code BR) is a metro line in Taipei operated by Taipei Metro, named after the districts it connects: Wenshan and Neihu. It is an automated medium-capacity rubber-tyred metro line and is long, serving a total of 24 st ...

, Taipei, Taiwan ;Europe * Berlin U-Bahn ( U1 and U2 lines) * Copenhagen Metro * Docklands Light Railway (partial) * Frankfurt U-Bahn: U1 (partial) * Hamburg U-Bahn ( U3 line) * Paris Metro (

Line 2 Line 2 or 2 Line may refer to: Public transport Americas *2 (New York City Subway service), a rapid transit service in the A Division of the New York City Subway *2 Line (Sound Transit), a light rail line in Seattle, Washington *Line 2 Bloor–Dan ...

and Line 6) * Vienna U-Bahn ( U6 line) * Wuppertal Suspension Railway *

Stockholm Metro The Stockholm metro ( sv, Stockholms tunnelbana) is a rapid transit system in Stockholm, Sweden. The first line opened in 1950, and today the system has 100 stations in use, of which 47 are underground and 53 above ground. There are three colou ...

(Slussen-Gamla Stan) ;Oceania *

Melbourne Metro The Metro Tunnel (previously known during planning as the Melbourne Metro Rail Project) is a metropolitan rail infrastructure project currently under construction in Melbourne, Australia. It includes the construction of twin 9-kilometre rail tun ...

Sydney Metro The Sydney Metro is a fully automated rapid transit system serving the city of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Currently consisting of one line that opened on 26 May 2019, it runs from Tallawong to Chatswood and consists of 13 stations ...

Northwest Line in Sydney, Australia (skytrain section) ;Disused Forest Hills El 1910

* Boston Elevated Railways - Atlantic Avenue Elevated, Charlestown Elevated, Washington Street Elevated, Causeway Street Elevated * Elevated railways operated by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company and Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company in New York City * Liverpool Overhead Railway * The elevated Airport line of Kolkata Suburban Railway, closed in 2016 for reconstruction relating Kolkata Metro line 4

People mover

* Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover, a people mover at and around Tomorrowland, Magic Kingdom, Walt Disney World Resort, Orlando, Florida, United States * AirTrain JFK, a people mover at and around John F. Kennedy International Airport, New York City, New York, United States * ATL Skytrain, a people mover at Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Atlanta, Georgia, United States *

Changi Airport Skytrain The Changi Airport Skytrain is an automated people mover (APM) that connects Terminals 1, 2 and 3 at Singapore Changi Airport. Opened in 1990, it was the first driverless and automated system of its kind in South East Asia. The Changi Airport Sk ...

, an inter-terminal people mover at Changi International Airport in Singapore * Detroit People Mover, an urban transit people mover in Detroit, Michigan, United States *

, an inter-terminal automated people mover in

and Düsseldorf, Germany * Metromover, a people mover at Miami, Florida, United States *

, a people mover at

Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport is a civil–military public airport east of downtown Phoenix, in Maricopa County, Arizona, United States. It is Arizona's largest and busiest airport, and among the largest commercial airports in th ...

, Phoenix, Arizona, United States

Proposed designs

* UC San Diego Blue Line extension will mostly be aerial light rail. *

Réseau express métropolitain The Réseau express métropolitain (REM; en, Metropolitan Express Network) is a light metro rapid transit system under construction in Greater Montreal, Quebec, Canada. When completed in 2025, the system will link several Montreal suburbs and ...

* Phnom Penh SkyTrain (Cambodia) * Ho Chi Minh City Metro (Vietnam) will be partially elevated * Managua Metro (Nicaragua) * San Salvador Metro (El Salvador) * Ljubljana Metro (Slovenia)

References

{{Authority control Railways by type