Lakeside Trams, Hillside Elevators, Incline Cars, Cable Cars

Category: File - :Tram 2552 at Mitcham.JPG|thumb|left|275px|A tramway used on Tramlink Route 3 of the Croydon Tramlink owned by FirstGroup under contract by TfL in London.

A tram, tramcar, trolley, trolleycar, or streetcar is a railborne vehicle, of lighter weight and construction than a conventional train, designed for the transport of passengers (and, very occasionally, freight) within, close to, or between villages, towns and/or cities, on tracks running primarily on streets. Certain types of cable car are also known as trams.

The Silesian Interurbans and the Melbourne network are claimed to be the largest tram networks in the world. During a while in the 1980s the world's largest tram system was in Leningrad, USSR, being included in Guinness World Records. Other large systems include Amsterdam, Basel, and Zurich. Until the system started to be converted to trolleybus (and later bus) in the 1930s, the first-generation London network was also one of the world's largest, with of route in 1934. London Passenger Transport Board: Annual Report, 1938

Tramways with tramcars (or street railways with streetcars: US) were common throughout the industrialised world in the late 19th and early 20th centuries but they had disappeared from most British, Canadian, French and U.S. cities by the mid-20th century.Jeffrey Spivak: Streetcars are back from Landscape Architecture Department, UC Davis. Retrieved 10 February 2009.

By contrast, trams in parts of continental Europe continued to be used by many cities, although there were contractions in some countries, including the Netherlands. Musée des Transports Urbains - Histoire. (In French) Retrieved 11 February 2009.

Since 1980 trams have returned to favour in many places, partly because their tendency to dominate the highway, formerly seen as a disadvantage, is now considered to be a merit. New systems have been built in the United States, Great Britain, Ireland, France and many other countries. Tram from EconomicExpert.com. Retrieved 11 February 2009.

Tramways are now included in the wider term "light rail", which also includes segregated systems. Some systems have both segregated and street-running sections, but are usually then referred to as trams, because it is the equipment for street-running which tends to be the decisive factor. Vehicles on wholly segregated light rail systems are generally called trains, although cases have been known of "trains" built for a segregated system being sold on to new owners and becoming "trams".

Category: File - :Croydon Tramlink Addiscombe Road.jpg|thumb|right|275px|A tramway on Tramlink route 1 on Croydon Tramlink in London.