page_title: Trams in Belgrade
section_title: Restoration of Line No. 1
hierarchical_section_title: Trams in Belgrade / History / 21st century / Restoration of Line No. 1
caption_attribution_description: Čeština: Ulice Krále Milana v Bělehradě, hlavním městě Srbska English: Kralja Milana Street, Belgrade, Serbia Српски / srpski: Ulica Kralja Milana u Beogradu, glavnom gradu Srbije
context_page_description: The Belgrade tram system is a 1000 mm gauge network that in 2011 had 10 routes running on 43.5 kilometres of track in the city of Belgrade, the capital of Serbia. It is operated with around 200 trams, including ČKD Tatra KT4, CAF Urbos, and DUEWAG Be 4/6 vehicles. The first tram line was introduced on 14 October 1892. In the late 2000s, complete reconstruction of the system commenced.
context_section_description: After new city government took over in 2013, they announced the creation of a pedestrian zone in the entire central section of Belgrade. City manager Goran Vesić announced that one single tram line, using the original number 1, will replace all four trolleybus lines (19, 21, 22 and 29) and the only bus line (31), which traverse through the city’s main street Kralja Milana. Regarding reasons, Vesić stated that the overhead lines look ugly in downtown and that citizen complained about the noise made by the trolleybuses. The immediate reaction of the citizens was mostly negative.
  However, some of the advantages of the trolleybuses are their minimal noise pollution. Also, there is a matter of price of digging up the entire center of the city so that at least 6 km (3.7 mi) of tram tracks can be placed, and the cost of buying the new trams which will supposedly be operated on capacitors, without the grid. At the moment, five lines pass through the main street 47 times per hour. On average, that is one vehicle on every 77 seconds, which is virtually impossible with only one line.
  In May 2017, Prime Minister of Serbia Aleksandar Vučić, even though the Belgrade's city transportation is completely outside of his jurisdiction, stated that he wants to abolish the trolleybus network completely and replace it with the electric buses. As a reason, he said that the trolleybuses are causing problems and that when one stops due to the malfunction, it stops the entire traffic behind it. Though electric buses may be a better solution than the trams, the reasoning is dubious. Trolleybus has the same traffic avoidance as an electric bus and much easier than a tram. Contrary to the trams, which indeed stop all the trams behind when one malfunction because they all use the same tracks, when a trolleybus is broken, it is simply unhooked from the grid and is easily bypassed by the trolleybus behind it.
  In November 2018, Vesić, now a deputy mayor, confirmed that the tram line No. 1 will be conducted through downtown instead of electric buses. He announced that the laying of tracks will began soon and that the entire work, which would include the narrowing of the central city street, Kralja Milana, will be finished in two years. However, by 2020, nothing had been done, and even during the prolonged reconstruction of the Republic Square, where the route goes, the tracks were not laid. In the new plan for the future several years from February 2020, the line was kept as the project. Also in February 2020 city announced the reconstruction of the starting section of the proposed line, the Vasina Street, for 2021, but that it is unlikely the line will be introduced then. If introduced later, it would include the new digging of the 2020-2021 reconstructed Republic Square and Vasina Street. At this time, the line was described as the circular one, without the electric grid but with the "internal source" and the city claimed they contacted "Siemens" to construct the original streetcars as they were at the 1900s, which "Siemens" accepted.
caption: Belgrade's main street, Kralja Milana. Proposed line No. 1 would span along the entire avenue.
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