Public transport

Public transport (Commonwealth English) comprises all transport systems in which the passengers do not travel in their own vehicles. It is also called public transportation, public transit or mass transit (US English). While it is generally taken to include rail and bus services, wider definitions would include scheduled airline services, ferries, taxicab services etc. - any system that transports members of the general public. A further restriction that is sometimes applied is that it should take place in shared vehicles, which would exclude taxis insofar as they're not shared.

History

Conveyances for public hire are as old as the first manned ferries, and the earliest public transport was water transport, for on land people walked or rode an animal. This form of transport is part of Greek mythology - corpses in ancient Greece were always buried with a coin underneath their tongue to pay the ferryman Charon to take them to Hades.

Related Topics:
Ferries - Rode an animal - Greek mythology - Charon - Hades

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Some historic forms of public transport are the stagecoach, travelling an appointed route from inn to inn, and the horse-drawn boat carrying paying passengers, which was a feature of canal systems from their 17th-century origins.

Related Topics:
Stagecoach - Horse-drawn boat - Canal

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The omnibus, the first organized public transit system within a city, appears to have been originated in Nantes, France, in 1826.

Related Topics:
Omnibus - Nantes - 1826

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