Elbeuf tramway

With its four standard gauge lines, each nine kilometers long and diverging from Place du Calvaire, the network transported up to 1.5 million people, in 1899, at the beginning of the operation.

Located 20 kilometers upstream from Rouen, with its agglomeration extending on both banks of the Seine, the textile city of Elbeuf considered itself neglected by the railway since the Paris-Rouen line, inaugurated in 1843, had bypassed it.

The new mode of communication arrived in this agglomeration, with a population of 40,000, only in 1865 during the construction of the Oissel to Serquigny line, which allowed a direct connection between Rouen and Caen.

A few years later, in 1883, Elbeuf was connected to the transversal Rouen-Orléans line with the completion of the section between its station and that of Petit-Quevilly, but this did not solve the problem of urban transportation.

[1] However, in 1877, Théodore de Ridder, representing the General Company of Narrow-Gauge Railways of Brussels, submitted an ambitious project to serve the Elbeuf agglomeration with a network of steam and horse-drawn tramways for passenger and freight transport.

The main line would have crossed the Seine, passed through Saint-Aubin-lès-Elbeuf, and connected to the Rouen tramway network at Sotteville-lès-Rouen after covering 18.300 km, before reaching the Rouen-Martainville station via a three-rail section.

Three horse-drawn lines would have served the city center, using its narrow streets and connecting the Saint-Pierre-Sotteville axis to the Elbeuf - Saint-Aubin and Elbeuf-Ville stations.

[4] Even though the enthusiasm of the population was great, as evidenced by numerous petitions in favor of the network and multiple observations made during the public utility inquiry conducted in 1879, the lines, which had been declared of public utility by decree in 1882,[5] were never built due to lack of financial support from industrialists, hostility from the Western Railway Company, which feared competition from the Rouen line, and the economic slowdown linked to the Great Depression of 1882.

[1] The latter proposed the construction of five standard gauge lines, including one with horse traction, with a total length of 9,800 meters, still centered around Place du Calvaire.

5 with horse traction was finally not built due to operational difficulties related to wagon traffic on a single track, the high cost of maintaining a stable, and the presence of a turntable in the city center.

From the beginning of operation, numerous defects were noted in the establishment of the line, such as the impossibility of two tramcars crossing at Place du Calvaire due to the insufficient width of the track (this problem was quickly resolved - see the illustration opposite - without knowing the exact date, probably before the second quarter of 1899).

Due to the limited speed of the convoys in the city center (12 km/h maximum) and to meet schedules never respected, the motormen pushed their machines to the ends of the lines, disregarding all safety rules.

Not without exaggeration, the local press reported numerous accidents caused by this disregard for safety, stating that the disabled and elderly were decimated by the tramway at a frightful rate.

[14] The lack of qualification of the Elbeuf employees forced the company to call upon personnel from the second network of tramways in Rouen without improving the quality of service.

The network was able to operate, every morning and evening between Place du Calvaire and Saint-Pierre-les-Elbeuf, a workers' train composed of four trailers flanked by two motorcars.

[19] But the operation experienced further degradation as the company recruited, due to a lack of available workforce, young personnel (some wattmen were less than sixteen years old), who had received no training and were left to their own devices.

The young tram drivers rode at their own whims, burned the stop posts, refused to give change, insulted passengers on the motorcars.

[16] Sometimes, even when they reached the end of the line, the employees did not take the time to maneuver the trailers and thus pushed back the carriages, sitting in the passenger compartment of the motorcars, vaguely supervising the tramway operation between stops.

[16] The disenchantment of passengers, competition from road services (factories preferred to transport their employees by trucks, then by buses) led to increased deficits while shareholders only thought of getting rid of this financial burden.

The frequency of service on the lines further reduced in the early 1920s, the poorly paid personnel triggered a strike on January 8, 1926, which signaled the end of the network.

3 - From Place du Calvaire to Saint-Aubin (station on the Rouen to Serquigny line), via Rue de Paris (major communication route No.

[21] A single building was sufficient for the operation of the network and housed the Company's offices, the depot and workshop for equipment repairs, as well as the power plant supplying the line.

[23] This vast complex (expanded in 1910) was located within the territory of the municipality of Saint-Aubin-lès-Elbeuf, not far from the Seine, within an area bounded by the streets Nivert, Saint-Louis, and Caroline.

Despite capacity extensions, and considering the electrical power sold to individuals or businesses, this plant proved inadequate and a new one was commissioned in June 1913 in Grand-Quevilly, equipped with 4 turbines of 7,500 hp,[22] intended to supply a new tramway network between Rouen and Elbeuf.

It was connected to the Elbeuf tramway by a feeder between Grand-Quevilly and Grand-Couronne through the Rouvray forest, then reached Orival up to a substation located on Rue Chanzy.

A card for 1.25 FRF allowed an additional journey between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m.[28] To try to regain the initial traffic of the network, the company created a transfer fare between the two lines at 15 and 10 centimes between Les Rouvalets, L'assemblée, Saint-Aubin, and Elbeuf-ville in 1901.