Trolley Buses in Detroit

[Hermod]

Around 1950 when I was eleven, we used to drive from out home near Harper and Whittier on the NE side to Dearborn to visit my uncle who live just off of Warren.

Part of the trip [[so it must have been an east-west road) had trolley busese on it. These were rubber-tired buses with two trolley poles reaching two trolley wires [[they couldn't use through the tracks return like the street cars did). The trolley pole pivoted and gave them enough side to side movement to permit them to move from the parking lane to the driving lane and go back.

Anyone know what street that was and when they were discontinued??

[MikeM]

Possibly Warren Avenue; discontinued in 1961:

http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...tos1940sE.html

[big c]

also the Grand River line had them because I remember riding them to Wilbur
Wright High School in the fall of 1962.....
big c

[Hermod]

also the Grand River line had them because I remember riding them to Wilbur
Wright High School in the fall of 1962.....
big c

How many cities had a high school like Wilbur Wright Aero-Mechanics?

Detroit went all out for vocational education with Wilbur Wright, Cass Tech, and Commercial.

[Hermod]

Possibly Warren Avenue; discontinued in 1961:

http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...tos1940sE.html

Must have been Warren Ave. Environmentally green, but overhead maintenance and lack of flexibility of moving buses from one route to another must have killed it.

[MichMatters]

Must have been Warren Ave. Environmentally green, but overhead maintenance and lack of flexibility of moving buses from one route to another must have killed it.

More to the point, GM wanted the city to usee its diesel buses, only. From the ever-helpful Detroit Transit History website:

Four-hundred fifty [[450) small buses and eighty [[80) electric trolley-coaches were purchased by the DSR to start off the new decade. But perhaps the fleet that would have the most lasting impact on the city would be the 355 "king-size" GM diesel buses that began arriving in 1953. Not only would these coaches be used to replace the city's PCC fleet, but would launch the beginning of GM's monopoly of the Detroit transit system.

After having been praised by the DSR general manager as being more cost-efficient than gas buses, and even though public opinion polls conducted by the DSR in 1952 showed that the electric trolley-buses on both the Crosstown and Grand River lines were well liked by its riders [[who wanted more on other lines), the DSR made a sudden about-face. In 1955, the DSR announced that the "trackless" trolley-coaches were a "mistake" and should never have been purchased. Instead, the DSR now favored purchasing GM diesel coaches. Plans to expand electric bus service to other lines, including the Jefferson line [[a former PCC rail line), were abandoned.

Check out this entire page to see images and information on the system. A view along Grand River:



At Capitol Park:

[Hermod]

Early fifties, most DSR buses came in three flavors. The large buses were made by Mack and Twin Coach with the Mack buses being superior. The smaller buses were made by Ford and were used on the less traveled routes.

[Rocko]

Warren [[Crosstown) and Grand River were the two Trolley-bus lines in the city. Take a drive to the intersection of Warren and Grand River and look at the streetlights. Most of the oldies still have brackets with insulators which used to support the cantenary wires! I'm sure that intersection would have been rather complicated with wires going in all directions back in the day, much as streetcar intersections would have been. Interestingly enough, the two routes used different styles of coaches and they were not compatible.

Twin trolley buses started service in 1949 on the Crosstown Route:
http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...tos1940sE.html

St. Louis Car Company trolley buses resembled PCC streetcars in styling and began service in 1951 on the Grand River Line:
http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...tos1950sA.html [[scroll down)
Later years: http://www.detroittransithistory.inf...tos1950sB.html