2025 will certainly be a special year for one thing: the first World Tram Championships will be held in Vienna, where the most professional tram drivers will be able to show what they know. The fact that tram drivers are competing is nothing new: According to a statement from the Vienna City Council, the competition has been held every year since the European Championships in Dresden in 2012, but the World Championships will be held for the first time after that year.
The Austrian capital can already be considered an old fox as a manager, since in 2015 it already hosted the EB tram. But how should we imagine this? Competitors compete in teams of two in various tram disciplines: precise control, various skill tests and emergency braking. The hit song in tram driving competitions is the so-called “Bim Bowling”, the essence of which is that you have to roll a large ball towards the presented figures with the help of a tram.
“I am extremely proud of the performance of our colleagues, not only in competitions, but also during their daily work, when they transport our passengers safely and accurately through the streets of Vienna, either before sunrise or until late at night, and in any weather conditions,”
– Alexandra Reinagel, CEO of Wiener Linien, which runs public transport in Vienna, said. The Vienna City Hall stresses that the essential work of transport workers, including tram drivers, often goes unnoticed, and they want to draw attention to this with the competitions.
25 teams can take part in the competition, and who exactly will be revealed and from which country only in January 2025. According to Michael Ludwig, Mayor of Vienna, there is already a lot of interest in the competition from South America, Southeast Asia and Africa. Although there are still many question marks, there is a good chance that the Hungarians will also be in the global competition. As Mayor Gergely Karacsony recently reported,From this year's EC show in Frankfurt, Christina Schneider and Akos Bodnar, drivers of the BKV Zrt. tram, returned home with gold medals.
