Petit Trains 2 - Simplon Postcards

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	Petits Trains 2 Land Trains - Trackless Trains - Dotto Trains - Tschu-Tschu Trains This page is under construction
	Most forms of transport have their enthusiasts (usually male) but I have never met anyone over the age of five who claimed to be a Dotto Train fan. I would certainly not claim to be a great fan myself, since in many tourist areas they have taken the place of miniature railways. Hence nothing seems to have been published on what has become a very common form of tourist transport throughout the world. Somebody had to do it, so here is my humble homage to the 'Petit Train'. I rarely gave them a second thought until we started taking our young son on them whilst on holidays and for some reason I started taking images of them as they tried to run me over in many of the congested tourist areas of the world. Until this page these images have remained on my PC. Definition and names:- A trackless train (or land train, parking lot tram, Dotto train, Tschu-Tschu train) is a road-going articulated vehicle used for the transport of passengers, comprising a driving vehicle pulling one or more carriages connected by drawbar couplings, in the manner of a road going railway train. Note that a Road Train refers to heavy goods vehicle trains and is not a term that should be applied, although widely used. Dotto and Tschu-Tschu are the trademark names of the two main manufacturers of these vehicles in Italy and Germany respectively. Given that the most enthusiastic operators of these vehicles are the French, it seems strange that I have not discovered a major constructor in that country - they mainly use Italian Dotto Trains. Trackless train or land train are descriptive terms for the rubber tired road-going vehicles to distinguish them from rail mounted trains. The Tschu-Tschu train and Dotto train names stems from genericized trademarks of trackless train manufacturers, although Deltrain (Portugal), The Railroad Factory (USA), City Trains (Germany), Wattman (Canada) and STS Funtrain (Austria) also are manufacturers. Parking lot tram is a common name reflecting their use in parking lot transport. The lack of a generic name for trackless trains often leads to them being called trams, people movers or road trains. Due to cultural terminology differences, trackless train, tram and parking lot tram usages occur in North America, while land train, road train, Tschu-Tschu train and Dotto train are used in Europe. In France 'Petit Train' is used for both narrow gauge railways and trackless tourist trains. A selection of genuine railway Petits Trains will be added on a separate page. Some of the earliest trackless trains were built in the USA for publicity or for use at international exhibitions. One of the first the first was the Fageol Auto Train, developed by Rolle B. Fageol, a prolific inventor. The H.O.McGee Manufacturing Company built about 16 motorcar trains from 1917, all slightly different in their design. Harry O.McGee was well known in the automobile industry in the USA at that time for his unique ideas for auto body construction. They were sent out on different tours around the USA and abroad. One was the MGM trackless train which crossed from New York to Los Angeles between 1925-26 to publicise the new highway system. It later visited the UK. It is a pet theory of mine that the European land trains developed from the lightweight narrow gauge trains built by Decauville and the like between the wars. When the little steam engines were replaced with petrol or diesel locos they were often given fake chimneys to look like steam trains. When the diesels also wore out, various French railways began to pull their railway coaches with farm tractors which were wide enough to straddle the narrow tracks. These tractors were also modified to look like steam locos. It was a small step to abandon the rails altogether and build equivalent road coaches to emulate their Decauville ancestors. I have no evidence to back up this idea, but look at the evolution images below. Dotto Trains are the most widely used trackless trains in Europe. The company was founded by Ivo Dotto in Castelfranco Veneto, in the Treviso region of Italy, in 1962. Ivo Dotto immediately made his mark on the market and become the world’s leading manufacturer of tourist trains. Ivo’s creations have been sold in more than fifty different countries spanning five continents. Dotto is now run by Bruna Dotto. It still designs and makes all of its trains from start to finish in Italy.

The H.O.McGee Manufacturing Company built about 16 motorcar trains from 1917, all slightly different in their design. Harry O.McGee was well known in the automobile industry in the USA at that time for his unique ideas for auto body construction. They were sent out on different tours around the USA and abroad. One was sold as the MGM trackless train which crossed from New York to Los Angeles between 1925-26 to promote the development of a national highway system as advocated by Herbert Hoover. It later visited Canada and the UK. The train consisted of a 'locomotive' and an observation coach, which was superbly fitted out to accommodate five staff, complete with beds and a toilet. A steam loco effect was achieved by dropping oil into the vehicle’s exhaust manifold, creating the smoke that emitted from the smokestack. The smoke was conveyed via a small pipe to the smokestack. Inside it were revolving blades, which caused the smoke to come out in puffs, instead of a steady stream.

	Sections on this Page Pre-WW2 Trackless Trains Fageol Trackless Train H.O.McGee Trackless Trains Evolution of the Trackless Train in Europe? Early tractor-based Trackless Trains in Europe Dotto Trains Dotto Train Classes Dotto P90 United Kingdom Bridlington Clacton Cromer Littlehampton France Monaco Switzerland Other French Railway Pages Les Petits Trains 1 Les Petits Trains 2 - Land Trains - this page! Chemin de fer de Corse Chemin de fer de Provence Petit Train du Cap Ferret	Associated Pages Cruise Ships Ocean Liners UK Excursion Vessels World Ferry Fleets Simplon Postcards. Home Page Simplon Postcards - Recent Updates - Simplon Postcards facebook page References to be added Contacts to be added
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