Railbus 79964 at York Railfest.JPG
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A railbus is a lightweight passenger railcar that shares many aspects of its construction with a bus, typically having a bus (original or modified) body and four wheels on a fixed base, instead of on
bogie A bogie ( ) (in some senses called a truck in North American English) is a chassis or framework that carries a wheelset, attached to a vehicle—a modular subassembly of wheels and axles. Bogies take various forms in various modes of transp ...
s. Originally designed and developed during the 1930s, railbuses have evolved into larger dimensions, with characteristics similar in appearance to a light railcar, with the terms ''railcar'' and ''railbus'' often used interchangeably. Railbuses designed for use specifically on little-used railway lines were commonly employed in countries such as Germany, Italy, France, the United Kingdom and Sweden. Today, railbuses are being replaced by modern light DMU railcar designs. Modern diesel-electric railcars, which can be run coupled as multiple units, like the
Stadler RS1 Stadler may refer to: * Stadler (surname) * Stadler Rail, a Swiss manufacturer of railway rolling stock See also * Staedtler, a German manufacturing company based in Nuremberg {{Disambiguation ru:Штадлер ...
, the RegioSprinter of Siemens or the successor Siemens Desiro share role and specifications with railbuses (albeit with improvements in noise, low floor design,
fuel efficiency Fuel efficiency is a form of thermal efficiency, meaning the ratio of effort to result of a process that converts chemical potential energy contained in a carrier (fuel) into kinetic energy or work. Overall fuel efficiency may vary per device, wh ...
, speed and other measures) but are usually not referred to by the term "railbus" any longer.


Usage by country


Argentina

Locally manufactured TecnoTren railbuses are in use around Argentina, most notably on the University train of La Plata. They are mostly used in rural parts of the country where the tracks have not yet been repaired and so can't handle the weight of regular trains.


Australia

In 1937, the NSW Department of Railways added six Waddington-built four-wheel streamlined '' FP Paybuses'' to serve on small branch lines out Cowra and Harden that did not have enough passengers to justify a rail motor. Powered by a Ford V8 engine, they were given the designation FP1 to FP6. When the railbus service wasn't popular, several of the buses became mobile pay cars used to pay railway employees at stations and working on tracks. In December 1941, one of these railbuses (FP 5) was destroyed when dynamite was placed on railway tracks near Yanderra. The three-man crew of the railbus were killed in the explosion. Though £2,000 of loose cash was taken, the safe in the railcar could not be opened by the robbers. No one was prosecuted for the offence. The first railbus, FP1, has been restored where it is on display at the NSW Rail Museum in Thirlmere. Another seven were built by
Comeng Commonwealth Engineering (often shortened to Com-Eng, later Comeng was an Australian engineering company that designed and built railway locomotives, rolling stock and trams. History Smith and Waddington, the predecessor to Commonwealth Engi ...
in the 1960s. In Queensland, " RailBus service" refers to road bus service running parallel to portions of some railway lines, substituting for commuter train.


Czech Republic and Slovakia

In the Czech Republic and Slovakia, railbuses are used on less frequented rural lines. Most railbuses are based on a former ČSD M 152.0
diesel multiple unit A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple-unit train powered by on-board diesel engines. A DMU requires no separate locomotive, as the engines are incorporated into one or more of the carriages. Diesel-powered single-unit railcars are also ...
, also known as ČD/ŽSR Class 810.


Canada

The Kaoham Shuttle utilizes DMU railbuses for its daily service between Lillooet and
D'Arcy, British Columbia D'Arcy is an unincorporated community in the Canadian province of British Columbia, approximately 150 kilometres northeast of the city of Vancouver. Located at the head of Anderson Lake (British Columbia), Anderson Lake, D'Arcy, also known as Ne ...
.


Germany

In Germany, the Schienenbus was developed in the 1930s to fulfill the need for an inexpensive rail vehicle. It was built to standard specifications on Germany's Reichsbahn (the predecessor to DB) to meet the demand for cost-effective services on light railways or '' Kleinbahnen'' (the
Wismar railbus The 'Hanover version' of the Wismar railbus (''Wismarer Schienenbus'') was developed in the early 1930s as a light railbus for economical passenger services on branch lines in Germany. History As early as the 1920s, light branch lines (the so ...
was a pioneer in those days.) After the Second World War, the eventually ubiquitous
Uerdingen railbus The Uerdingen railbus (German: ''Uerdinger Schienenbus'') is the common term for the multiple units which were developed by the German firm of Waggonfabrik Uerdingen for the Deutsche Bundesbahn and private railways after the Second World War. Th ...
es were developed by Deutsche Bundesbahn in single-engined and double-engined versions. The latter were powerful enough to haul
through coach In rail terminology, a through coach is a passenger car (coach) that is re-marshalled during the course of its journey. It begins the journey attached to one train, and arrives at its destination attached to another train. Through coaches save t ...
es and freight cars. Matching trailers and driving trailers were developed as well. These railbuses were a predecessor of the modern
diesel multiple unit A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple-unit train powered by on-board diesel engines. A DMU requires no separate locomotive, as the engines are incorporated into one or more of the carriages. Diesel-powered single-unit railcars are also ...
s. In the late 1950s, Deutsche Reichsbahn in the GDR developed the single-engined class VT 2.09 with matching trailers and driving trailers, built by Waggonbau Bautzen. A number of serious accidents in Germany in the late 1970s involving railbuses resulted in the specification and development of larger, more robustly designed diesel railcars. Although these cars were more similar in size to the U.S. produced diesel railcars, they would not have complied with current
FRA A friar is a member of one of the mendicant orders founded in the twelfth or thirteenth century; the term distinguishes the mendicants' itinerant apostolic character, exercised broadly under the jurisdiction of a superior general, from the ol ...
requirements, and, like their North American cousin rail diesel cars, are largely railroad-derivative designs. The
DB Class 628 The DB Class 628 is a twin-car, diesel multiple unit operated by the Deutsche Bahn for local passenger rail services. Design ''(The following description is primarily related to the Class 628.4, and is largely valid for the other variants as wel ...
exemplifies the contemporary German diesel railcar. This type of car replaced the Schienenbus and locomotive-hauled train consists where possible on branch-line and main-line assignments during the 1980s and 1990s. Both the Uerdingen Schienenbus and the Bautzen railbuses have virtually disappeared from regular revenue service, but its diesel rail car successors are still widely used. DMUs of a third generation in succession after the Schienenbus are now being ordered by the hundreds in a variety of modular design combinations.


Hungary

The first railbuses appeared in Hungary in 1925, made by Ganz Works. From 1934,
MÁV Hungarian State Railways ( hu, Magyar Államvasutak, MÁV) is the Hungarian national railway company, with divisions "MÁV START Zrt." (passenger transport), "MÁV-Gépészet Zrt." (maintenance), "MÁV-Trakció Zrt." and "MÁV Cargo Zrt" (freig ...
started to use railbuses called Árpád, which were also manufactured by Ganz. These vehicles ran on the Budapest-Vienna line. In 1975, the last Árpád was scrapped. In 1986, due to the lack of ČD 810 trains, Ikarus converted an Ikarus 260 bus into a railbus on behalf of MÁV. This model was called Ikarus 725. Its variations 725.01, 722.01 and 723.01 were sent to Malaysia in 1988.


India

Indian Railways operates many railbuses on its branch lines. These railbuses are being replaced by
EMU The emu () (''Dromaius novaehollandiae'') is the second-tallest living bird after its ratite relative the ostrich. It is endemic to Australia where it is the largest native bird and the only extant member of the genus ''Dromaius''. The emu' ...
s due to increase in passengers. There is railbus on the Kalka-Shimla route (train number 72451), Mathura to Vrindavan (train number 72175) and Merta Jn to Merta City (train number 74804) as well, among others.


Indonesia

Railbuses in Indonesia are built locally by INKA and used in several local rail services operated by PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI). On August 5, 2012, the first railbus service in the country ''Batara Kresna'' railbus was launched to accommodate parts of ''
Prambanan Ekspres Prambanan Express ( id, Prambanan Ekspres), commonly abbreviated as Pramex (in English) and Prameks (in Indonesian) is a commuter rail service that operates between Yogyakarta, Special Region of Yogyakarta and Kutoarjo, Purworejo Regency, Centra ...
'' commuter rail passengers in
Central Java Central Java ( id, Jawa Tengah) is a province of Indonesia, located in the middle of the island of Java. Its administrative capital is Semarang. It is bordered by West Java in the west, the Indian Ocean and the Special Region of Yogyakarta in t ...
from Purwosari Station in Solo to Wonogiri Station in Wonogiri and vice versa. In 2014, KAI launched ''Kertalaya'' railbus in South Sumatra between Kertapati Station in
Palembang Palembang () is the capital city of the Indonesian province of South Sumatra. The city proper covers on both banks of the Musi River on the eastern lowland of southern Sumatra. It had a population of 1,668,848 at the 2020 Census. Palembang ...
to Indralaya Station in Ogan Ilir and vice versa to ease road traffic. In 2016, ''Lembah Anai'' Railbus was launched in West Sumatra to serve passengers from Kayu Tanam Station in
Padang Pariaman Padang Pariaman Regency is a regency ''(kabupaten)'' of West Sumatra, Indonesia. It has an area of 1,343.09 km2, and it had a population of 390,204 at the 2010 census and 430,626 at the 2020 census.Badan Pusat Statistik, Jakarta, 2021. The reg ...
to Minangkabau International Airport.


Ireland

The
Great Northern Railway of Ireland The Great Northern Railway (Ireland) (GNR(I) or GNRI) was an Irish gauge () railway company in Ireland. It was formed in 1876 by a merger of the Irish North Western Railway (INW), Northern Railway of Ireland, and Ulster Railway. The government ...
produced railbuses at the Railway Works in Dundalk.


Japan

The president of JNR visited West Germany in 1953 and was introduced to railbusses there. JNR subsequently drew up a plan for railbus introduction plan in JNR, and a prototype was built in 1955. However, JNR found railbuses less reliable in daily operation as compared to standard rail equipment and discontinued their use in the 1960s. Railbuses produced by Fuji Heavy Industries were operational on the
Nanbu Jūkan Railway The was a railbus line in eastern Aomori Prefecture, Japan. Services on the railway began 1962 and ceased in 1997 due to financial hardship. It connected Noheji Station in the town of Noheji to Shichinohe Station in the town of Shichinohe. Orga ...
from 1962 until the line ceased operations in 1997, though the preserved units can still be seen at
Shichinohe Station is a former railway station on the former Nanbu Jūkan Railway in Shichinohe, Aomori, Japan. There was once a plan to use the Nanbu Jūkan Railway to connect the Tōhoku Shinkansen with Noheji or Mutsu, but the railway was closed before t ...
. Motorization soared in Japan from the 1970s on, reducing consuming passenger numbers on local private railways. Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd. in 1982 began development of an "LE-Car" that incorporates significantly the structure of the bus, deficit local lines of JNR has been adopted by many of the railway company that local governments and private companies are operated by joint investment.


Mongolia

The
Ulaanbaatar Railbus The Ulaanbaatar Railbus is a Rail transport in Mongolia, rail-based public transit system in the Mongolian capital of Ulan Bator, Ulaanbaatar. Route The rail route has one line, and starts at the west side of the capital at the Tolgoit Station, th ...
is a railbus-based public transit system in the Mongolian capital of Ulaanbaatar.


Netherlands

In the Netherlands, a Michelin car was tried in 1932.


Peru

Railbuses are used on PeruRail.


Saudi Arabia and Syria

Syrian Syrians ( ar, سُورِيُّون, ''Sūriyyīn'') are an Eastern Mediterranean ethnic group indigenous to the Levant. They share common Levantine Semitic roots. The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Syrian people is a blend of both indi ...
railbuses are used in
Damascus )), is an adjective which means "spacious". , motto = , image_flag = Flag of Damascus.svg , image_seal = Emblem of Damascus.svg , seal_type = Seal , map_caption = , ...
from
Ma'adan Ma'adan ( ar, معدان) is a Syrian town in Raqqa District, Raqqa. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), Ma'adan had a population of 8,663 in the 2004 census. Syrian Civil War Ma'adan was captured by rebel forces in th ...
to Sarouja, and in Saudi Arabia from Riyadh to Medina and Mecca.


Sri Lanka

In areas without significant demand for regular commuter trains, such as in the Eastern province, railbus connects towns and cities. These buses were built by converting two buses originally built for road transport.


United Kingdom

British Rail British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British rai ...
produced a variety of railbuses as a means both of building new rolling stock cheaply, and to provide services on lightly used lines economically. A variety of railbus known as Pacers, which were constructed in the 1980s, remained in service until 2021, they were phased out as a result of their failure to comply with accessibility requirements.


United States

There are records of bus bodies being fitted to special Mack Truck chassis built with small four-wheel bogie trucks under the engine and hood, and larger flanged steel drive wheels, as early as 1903.
Osgood Bradley Car Company The Osgood Bradley Car Company manufactured railway Passenger car (rail), passenger cars and streetcars in Worcester, Massachusetts. History The company was founded in 1822 to manufacture stagecoaches and sleighs. The company's first railway p ...
built one of the more popular bodies during the 1920s. Fairbanks-Morse, later a locomotive builder, offered similar conversions fitted to
Dodge Dodge is an American brand of automobiles and a division of Stellantis, based in Auburn Hills, Michigan. Dodge vehicles have historically included performance cars, and for much of its existence Dodge was Chrysler's mid-priced brand above P ...
truck chassis in the mid-1930s, preferring to fit the truck chassis with van bodies and supply a small matching passenger coach trailer. Some railroads built their own bodies on truck or large, powerful luxury passenger car chassis. Most continued the pattern of a small two axle truck in front, and a single drive axle in the rear. One example from the 1930s, built on a
White Truck The White Motor Company was an American automobile, truck, bus and agricultural tractor manufacturer from 1900 until 1980. The company also produced bicycles, roller skates, automatic lathes, and sewing machines. Before World War II, the comp ...
chassis, is preserved at the National Museum of Transportation in Kirkwood, Missouri. After World War II a number of more modern light train concepts appeared. Few were successful, as many railroads cooperated with highway bus services to eliminate passenger trains from their branch lines. Some, like the
American Car & Foundry ACF Industries, originally the American Car and Foundry Company (abbreviated as ACF), is an American manufacturer of railroad rolling stock. One of its subsidiaries was once (1925–54) a manufacturer of motor coaches and trolley coaches und ...
Motorailer, blurred the line between railcar and railbus. Others, such as the Mack FCD, landed firmly in the railbus camp. Ten of the Macks were purchased by the
New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad , commonly known as The Consolidated, or simply as the New Haven, was a railroad that operated in the New England region of the United States from 1872 to December 31, 1968. Founded by the merger of ...
during 1951–1952. By the time they were delivered, however, a new president was in charge, and he had little interest in serving branch lines. Only one saw regular service. All were sold to other entities such as
Sperry Rail Service Sperry Rail Service is a rail inspection company founded in 1928 by Elmer Ambrose Sperry. The company was the first in the world to offer nondestructive testing of railroad track. Since its formation, Sperry has been contracted by most of the ma ...
, or to overseas railroads. In 1967 and 1968, Red Arrow Lines tested a
GM New Look bus The GM New Look bus is a municipal transit bus that was introduced in 1959 by the Truck and Coach Division of General Motors to replace the company's previous coach, retroactively known as the GM "old-look" transit bus. Also commonly known by ...
converted to operate on rails on its interurban routes and the Norristown High Speed Line."This bus rides rail or highway with equal ease". '' Railway Age'', 6 November 1967 page 26 In 1985, SEPTA tested an imported BRE-Leyland railbus on the now-closed Fox Chase to
Newton Newton most commonly refers to: * Isaac Newton (1642–1726/1727), English scientist * Newton (unit), SI unit of force named after Isaac Newton Newton may also refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Newton'' (film), a 2017 Indian film * Newton ( ...
section of the Fox Chase Line.


See also

*
Autorail The French word Autorail describes a single powered railcar capable of carrying passengers. While the concept faded for a while, it has been introduced with a new range of vehicles for both standard and metre gauge lines. Many autorails from the ...
* Dual-mode vehicle * Galloping Goose (railcar) *
GHE T 1 In 1933 the Gernrode-Harzgerode Railway Company (GHE) bought this twin-axled, narrow gauge railbus from ''Waggonfabrik Dessau'' and classified it as GHE T 1 within its vehicle fleet. The vehicle remained a one-off; bus services were more important ...
*
GWR railcars In 1933, the Great Western Railway introduced the first of what was to become a very successful series of diesel railcars, which survived in regular use into the 1960s, when they were replaced with the new British Rail "first generation" type ...
*
McKeen railmotor The McKeen Railmotor was a 6-cylinder self-propelled railcar or railmotor. When McKeen Company of Omaha, Nebraska, U.S.A., first unveiled the car in 1905, the McKeen was among the first engines with a distillate-fueled motor. Revisions to the Mc ...
* Railcar * Railmotor * Rail motor coach * Road–rail vehicle


References


External links


Project «El Expreso Panamericano»
{{Authority control Bus Hybrid vehicles pt:Automotora