<ul>
<li>1904 saw the opening of the New York City Subway with the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT) division, now known as the A division, along with the Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Corporation (BMT).</li>
<li>It is the world’s largest network spreading 380 kilometres handling 1.72 billion passengers a year.  The 36 lines operate day and night, thus requiring more maintenance. </li>
<li>The subway stations were targeted with crime and vandalism in the 1970s, leading to loss of ridership.</li>
</ul>

The NYC Subway

<ul>
<li>Greece opened up its electrified rapid transport lines in 1904, converting a former electric railways station called the Athens-Piraeus (which was opened in 1869).</li>
<li>The lines were expanded in the year 2000 and merged with the Athens Mass Transit System in 2011.</li>
<li>The aim of this service was to offer an alternative to car users, and lower the pollution levels.</li>
</ul>

Athens Metro

<ul>
<li>Hungary’s Budapest Metro became operational soon after London in 1896.  It is now a world heritage site. </li>
<li>This four-line network had various expansions and extensions and features the world’s first automated metro route back in 2014.</li>
<li>The travel time saved each year by the fourth line, called M4, is about 14 million hours.</li>
</ul>

Budapest Metro

<ul>
<li>Germany was not far behind in the Metro race and opened the U-Bahn in Berlin in 1902, which now has more than 151 km of track, most of it underground.</li>
<li>The U-Bahn began as an elevated transport link between two heavily populated zones of the city. </li>
<li>The trains carried 553 million passengers in 2017 and travel a total of 132 million kilometres each year.</li>
</ul>

Berlin U-Bahn

<ul>
<li>The first metro to use the term ‘metro’, France opened Paris Métro in 1900. </li>
<li>This 16 line network is 214 km long and has had approximately 1.52 billion passengers since 2016.</li>
<li>It is heavily decorated with exquisite art in most of its entrances.</li>
</ul>

The Paris Métro

<ul>
<li>1901 saw the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Subway opening in Boston, Massachusetts, US.</li>
<li>This train network has comparatively shorter lines and right from its inauguration was having the first electrified rapid transit line, now known as the Orange Line.</li>
</ul>

The MBTA Subway

<ul>
<li>In the US, the Chicago ‘L’ metro system started in 1897.  </li>
<li>It is the second most crowded electric train system in the country, with 24-hour services in select lines.</li>
<li>The train network is 165 km long with eight lines, including a ‘ring’ model that runs through the entire city in a circle.</li>
</ul>

Chicago ‘L’

<ul>
<li>The same year when the Budapest Metro opened(1896), Scotland inaugurated the world’s third oldest metro system.  </li>
<li>The route remains untouched and carries 13 million passengers every year. </li>
<li>The subway network has seen a number of upgrades and makeovers including extensive modernization of all the stations and replacement of trains and ramps.</li>
</ul>

The Glasgow Subway

<p>Electric metro trains first became operational in London back in 1890, as a part underground and part overground network. </p>
<p>Called the London Underground, this is a 402 km network with 270 stations and transports up to five million passengers a day.</p>

The First Electric Metro Trains

Metro systems across the world have been in operation since the late 1800s and transport millions of commuters across cities every day.

Berlin U-Bahn

World's oldest metro systems - Railway Technology

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