Despite the proliferation of streetcar projects in the United States in recent years, there is little research on the streetcar’s role as a transportation service. This study examines the experiences of the modern-era streetcars operated in Little Rock, Memphis, Portland, Seattle, and Tampa. The authors discovered that in these cities, the primary purpose of the streetcar was to serve as a development tool (all cities), a second objective was to serve as a tourism-promoting amenity (Little Rock, Tampa), and transportation objectives were largely afterthoughts with the notable exception of Portland, and to a lesser degree, Seattle. Based on this study, the authors suggest that planners and policymakers in other cities think carefully about the fundamental purpose of any proposed streetcar in their communities and to proceed in all their decision making with that fundamental purpose clearly in mind. The authors also urge planners and policymakers in other cities to regard the example of Portland with much more caution: Portland’s experience is the result of a unique combination of external factors and local decisions that may or may not be applicable elsewhere. Appendices contain detailed case studies of each of the five cities examined in the report.
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