Bombardier Guided Light Transit

rdf:langString Bombardier Guided Light Transit

rdf:langString Guided Light Transit (GLT, French: Transport sur Voie Réservée or TVR) is the name of guided bus technology and associated infrastructure designed and manufactured by Bombardier Transportation (now Alstom). It has been installed in two French cities: Nancy and Caen. As of 2018, only the Nancy system is in operation; the Caen system has been abandoned and now rebuilt as a conventional tramway by 2019. Both of the systems in these cities are referred to as "tramways on tyres", and in common with tram systems they use a surface guidance system and in normal operation are powered by electricity drawn from an overhead wire. However, while the vehicles are guided by a central guidance rail, they ride on rubber tyres, not on rails. There has been disagreement about whether they should be called "trams", for that reason and also because they are capable of being steered and operating independently of the guidance rail, using auxiliary diesel engines. GLT is effectively a model of guided dual-mode bus, but when GLT vehicles use a pantograph to collect current, as do those in Caen, they are not commonly considered to be trolleybuses. English transport publications generally refer to the GLT and the competing Translohr system as "rubber-tyred tramways", but rarely simply as "tramways", as they are not tramways in the conventional sense, but neither are they buses when pantograph-equipped and operating in service as designed (i.e. in electric mode). GLT is one of the few models (together with the Innovia APM) of rubber-tyred vehicles produced by Bombardier's transport division, which is otherwise focused on rail transport.