FEDIR PIROTSKY

who invented the tram

About the family in which on February 17, 1845
the outstanding Ukrainian electrical engineer
and inventor of the tram Fedir Apolonovych
Pirotskyi was born, currently there is a lack of
accurate records.

Fedir Pirotsky was educated at the Konstantinov

Cadet Corps in St. Petersburg and the
Mikhailovsky Artillery Academy. In 1871, he
received a referral to the department of technical
reports and estimates of the Main Artillery
Administration (GAU) in St. Petersburg.
For the first time, Pirotsky tries to
launch a tram in St. Petersburg.
However, it appeared on the route
only in the winter of 1895 and
moved not through the streets of the
city, but across the frozen river. A
real electric tram drove through the
streets of St. Petersburg only in
1907. And for example, in Moscow
- 1899. And all because of the
monopoly on transportation: the
then oligarchs-owners of horse
railways did not want to lose profit
and resisted the new type of
transport.
 This grand event in the world of technical progress took place in 1892, with considerable delay, more
than 10 years after the first public experiments and publications of Pirocky. But even despite such a
significant lag, Kyiv became the first city in Eastern Europe where an electric tram ran.

And two years later, in 1894, an electric tram made according to Pirocky's scheme appeared in Lviv.
At that time, the city was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. So Lviv became the second after Kyiv, the
second in Austria-Hungary and the fifth in Europe, where a new type of public transport with electric
traction went for the first time.
It took 11 years for the Ukrainian capital to arrive, despite the
fact that the electric tram was sometimes the only alternative
for Kyiv. The slopes of the Dnieper are so steep that steam
trams could not cope with them, not horse trams. Even six
horses could not lift a small carriage with passengers on the
modern Volodymyrivsky Uzvіz.

In June 1892, the first electric tram moved from Volodymyrsky

Uzvіz to Sadovska Street. Later, a real tram boom began: in 9
years, such trams appeared in 15 cities of the empire.