page_title: Loop Trolley
section_title: Rolling stock
hierarchical_section_title: Loop Trolley / Rolling stock
caption_attribution_description: English: Ex-Melbourne W2-class tram/streetcar 272 eastbound at the Occidental Park station, on Main Street, on the Waterfront Streetcar line in Seattle.
context_page_description: The Loop Trolley was a 2.2-mile, 10-station heritage streetcar line in St. Louis, Missouri. It operated from November 2018 to December 2019. As of December 2019, the Bi-State Development Agency, a regional transit operator, was seeking ways to restart operations.
  Opened in November 2018, the Loop Trolley connected the Delmar Loop district and the Missouri History Museum in Forest Park, serving parts of University City and the St. Louis neighborhoods of DeBaliviere Place, Skinker/DeBaliviere, and the West End. It also served two MetroLink light-rail stations: Delmar Loop and Forest Park–DeBaliviere.
  At its closing, the line operated from noon until 6 p.m. on Thursdays through Sundays. Passengers were carried on two replica-historic streetcars.
  The Loop Trolley Transportation Development District owns the line and trolley cars, which were operated by the non-profit Loop Trolley Company. Operating funds came from a one-cent sales tax collected by businesses along and near the line, and from fares and advertising.
  Ridership was far lower than expected, and the trolley ceased operations on December 29, 2019.
context_section_description: Loop Trolley service was provided by two faux-vintage streetcars acquired used from Portland, Oregon. A third vintage streetcar from Seattle was expected to join the fleet in 2019.
  In December 2013, the Loop Trolley district acquired from Portland transit agency TriMet two Gomaco-built Brill-replica streetcars which were then in operation on the Portland Vintage Trolley service, which use continued until mid-2014. Those two cars were designed to look like 1903 streetcars but were actually built in 1991 (car 511) and 1992 (car 512), and feature steel frames under their wooden bodies and more-modern propulsion equipment (including rebuilt 1940s trucks). For St. Louis, they were modified for wheelchair accessibility, to meet ADA regulations, with the installation of wheelchair lifts (one per side).  Gomaco was hired to carry out those and other modifications, and the work began at Gomaco's Ida Grove, Iowa, plant in August 2015. 
  In January 2016, it was announced that the Loop Trolley district had purchased three ex-Melbourne, Australia, W2-type streetcars from Seattle, which had operated on Seattle's Waterfront Streetcar line until it shut down in 2005.  Only one of the three was planned for immediate refurbishment, modification and use due to funding limitations. The necessary modifications included restoring doors on one side of the car, restoring steps to the doors (Seattle's line used high-platform stations which didn't necessitate steps), installing two wheelchair lifts, one on each side, and replacement of the car's trolley poles with a pantograph. The three cars were moved from Seattle in early June 2016. Cars 482 and 518 were taken to St. Louis and put in indefinite storage for potential future restoration and use. Car 512 was taken to Gomaco in Iowa, which had been awarded a $676,750 contract to restore and modify the car. 
  The operational fleet was to comprise three cars in 2019: two ex-Portland Brill replica cars (Portland Nos. 511–512) and one ex-Seattle, ex-Melbourne car (Seattle No. 512).  Ex-Portland cars 511–512 were renumbered 002 and 001, respectively, and ex-Seattle, ex-Melbourne car 512 was renumbered 003. Car 001 is painted red and cream, Car 002 blue and cream, and Car 003 orange and cream.
  At the time of the line's opening, Car 003 was still at Gomaco's Iowa plant, with its renovation and modification more than a year behind schedule, partly due to delays in getting parts from Germany. Car 003 was delivered to the Loop Trolley's maintenance facility on January 29, 2019.
caption: Ex-Melbourne trolley of the same type as the three acquired from Seattle for eventual use on the Loop Trolley line, shown in Seattle in 1994
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