Are trams that good (genuine question)?

Trams do not have to share the road with cars. They can have (and often do have) their own dedicated right of way.
In those situations the tram only really interacts with cars on intersections, similar to level crossings for rail.

I think it's more helpful to see a tram as an upgrade on a bus, rather than a downgrade on rail.
The main advantages of trams over busses are the increased capacity, and increased efficiency (less fuel, fewer drivers per passenger needed)

don't give in to tramsphobia.

Depends on the location. If done right, trams can be the single most efficient form of intra-city transit. Treating trams like cars is not doing it right.

My city has trams that are grade-separated from car traffic for most of their routes, but often run alongside cars within their own "lanes". Cars can still use that lane for maneuvers and overtaking, but whenever a tram approaches, it has the absolute right of way.

Tram tracks are much narrower compared to bus-sized streets. They can run through places where roads can't be built, and bypass busy intersections. They're also quieter, less disruptive (see: grassy tram tracks), less polluting (no asphalt dust or tyre particles), more durable, and more efficient (steel rolling on steel).

Trams usually don't have to care about ground clearance. This allows them to be built with a much lower floor. Running on fixed tracks also allows them to perfectly align with the platform at stops, which makes wheelchair accessibility trivial.

Unlike trolleys, trams can use pantographs to connect to the overhead wires, which is much simpler and less likely to fail compared to trolley poles, which require switching whenever the routes diverge, and can get caught on the wires. They also don't have to carry backup batteries or combustion engines.

I think trams are pretty great. There are pros and cons, of course. Pros being that they can be bigger than buses, lower rolling friction, etc. Cons being higher initial costs and being stuck to a fixed route.

But I also think they're better for short to mid-distance trips. Shorter is best done by bike
Mid - bus or tram
long - metro/train.

So getting around downtown or a neighborhood, or going a few neighborhoods over? definitely.

Going across town? you'll want rail.

So a commute may look like taking a bike/bus/tram to a station to get to down, then hopping "down" the transit hierarchy to a tram to get to where you're going.

I don't necessarily have resources on the cost to benefit ratio since that tends to differ based on where it's done.

But the overall idea is:
Buses - easy to get started, flexible routes, more expensive in long run for maintenance and fuel

Trams - higher infrastructure costs up front, but lower maintenance and cheap fuel (electricity), and higher capacity than buses

Metro - super high startup costs, super high carrying capacity, you get the idea

They're way better than buses. There's a direct comparison here: Birmingham is a small city, including a plot of bus times vs tram times at different times of day.

While the tram is substantially quicker at all times than the bus, the reliability of its timing, even during the most congested periods, provides an additional large benefit to users.

We think that people generate the most agglomeration benefits for a city when they travel at peak times, to get to and from work, meetings, and social events. Our tool shows us that at the times when people need to travel in order to generate these benefits, buses are extremely slow. And since buses are by far the largest mode of public transport in Birmingham this is likely to have significantly higher impact on Birmingham than in Lyon where the largest mode of public transport is the metro, which delivers reliable journey times no matter the time of day.

Our hypothesis is that Birmingham’s reliance on buses makes its effective population much smaller than its real population. This reduces its productivity by sacrificing agglomeration benefits. For the past six months, using our Real Journey Time tool, we’ve worked with The Productivity Insights Network to quantify that.

...

It's all about the right tool for the job. Trams work well for shorter trips, and can be a serious upgrade over buses.

However, there's a bit of a trend in North America to use low-floor trams in somewhat inappropriate places; building expensive tunnels, guideways, and stations in less than appropriate places. Which basically results in a metro, but worse (slower, more uncomfortable for riders, and still often interacts with traffic) for something that still ends up being expensive.

They have their own lanes most of the time and only rarely have to share with buses or cars in Switzerland for example.

People like them because they can be powered via electricity and offer a smoother ride compared to buses or cars.

Trams are great for short distances. I often use them to get from one end of the business district to the other, as it's slightly faster than walking and they're free.

However I once used the tram to get from work to my kid's baseball training and it took over an hour. I later realised that I'd taken the longest tram route on the planet (Melbourne CBD to Vermont). It's much slower than a car because it spends most of its time letting passengers on and off.

It all depends, really. As other people have pointed out, you can allay the problems of car traffic by giving trams right-of-way, dedicated lanes or both.

I've tried to summarise what I understand are the key pros and cons of trams vs. buses below. As you can see, I've come up with more positives than negatives, but it really does depend on the particular situation in each town or city. Mixed modes are always best, IMO!

Upsides

• Trams are generally easier to electrify than buses, so they can be more eco-friendly in that sense, though this is changing with better charging infrastructure, hydrogen fuel cells, etc., for buses.

• Trams can also be built with very low clearance, making it near impossible for them to run someone over, which is a good safety feature.

• They're generally quieter than buses, too.

Mixed

• Trams cost more to build compared with buses (because you need to lay tracks) but then cost less in the longer term (because rails and metal wheels are more efficient than tarmac roads and rubber wheels, and wear out more slowly). So, which is best from a cost POV depends on your exact situation.

• Tram rails can be laid with grass underneath, which is more eco-friendly for numerous reasons. Of course, this also entails a downside if you want to use that space for other vehicle types. Again, another one where a planner would need to weigh costs and benefits.

Downsides

• The key downside is that they need tracks: this makes them much harder to divert around some kinds of temporary obstructions which buses can easily manoeuvre around.

Well for starters a tram can move a lot more people than a bus with just 1 driver.

You have more safety in adverse weather conditions.

They usually last wayy longer than buses. (so more cost effective)

I'm not completely sure on the traffic one, like, they have their own lane, and in my country you cannot use it so could you elaborate on this one?

Of course a bus is better for flexibility, but for fixed travel routes the tram just seems a lot better for me.

An issue I have with trams is that they are very slow if not properly integrated in both the city layout and the general population of the city. For example, in Marseille, trams have to frequently compete with pedestrians and bicycles that keep walking/riding on the tram line. This doesn't happen with buses (or not as frequently).

The one thing that makes them better than buses in Marseille is that trams are more reliable time-wise since they don't have to share the road with cars.

Trams are awesome, I've used them quite a bit in Sheffield and Valencia and in both cases they were the best solution where an underground metro wasn't feasible.

My city has started separating tram lines from the roads with fences, and it's all just great. We had next to no bus lanes until this year, and I still have none where I live. The bus sits in traffic and can stop for around 5-10 times at a traffic light, while the tram only stops once. Sometimes even the bus driver opens the doors before getting to any station. This never happened with trams. On the other hand, if one tram breaks, the others have to wait for it to be moved - although this doesn't happen that often on the line I'm using the most.

Another thing to note is that even when there is no separation from the traffic and the lines are asphalted, it's still illegal to go on the tram tracks (albeit this is one of the rules that is not that well enforced, because our police sucks, it's good that it's there).

Our municipality also purchased longer trams and plans to purchase some more, some even longer than what we have now, but it's great. It's a good way of making public transit more attractive for the people, hopefully getting them out of the cars and solving congestion.

We also have a metro system, which is also great and highly appreciated, but it doesn't go anywhere in the city, and its extension has been rather slow in the last 30 years. The company managing it is also owned by the government directly, so that's another hurdle in its development. The tram network, on the other hand, is owned by the local transit company, and is denser. I'm sure there will be more extensions to it if the municipality will throw the right money at the right projects.

I get a bit annoyed at people not addressing the fact that they seem to share the road with cars.

So you're saying the cars are the problem...

yea they're pretty cool.

There's a lot of confusion with terms, the definitions are loose to begin with, and a lot of misuse as well, so terms are all a mess.

From what I see a tram (a streetcar in North America) is defined as sharing the road. But there are lots of people (and a certain prolific youtuber) that just wants to call everything a tram or a tram-[insert modifier].

A light rail has a dedicated right of way and as many grade separations as you want to pay for, all the way up to what's commonly called a metro. Too many people are incorrectly calling these trams.

As someone who had regularly traveled by bike on a road with tram tracks: This is definitely not fun, and I simply don't understand why the anti-car community hypes them. It's like shooting themselves in the foot.

A bit of a history of trams: they existed before the modern electric bus, as horse trams, because they could carry more people. Most tram networks have been removed since the introduction of the bus. Modern trams however can increase capacity a lot, and even small trams can fix hard problems like in the Lisbon inner city. Many modern trams are somewhere on the light rail spectrum and are both faster and often have more dedicated right of way, so they don't get stuck in traffic. Understanding this, you can see how you can often also fix the same issues with dedicated bus lanes, but a tram track also fixes refueling properly. A third option is of course a trolley bus or a trolley/battery hybrid. Every location needs something that fits the local circumstances.

Denver and Portland have pretty good light rail. They handle traffic areas well, and can move quickly between areas where they have long stretches of unobstructed rail. My only complaint is limited stations where you can board - like, if I have to walk a mile to the nearest station and a mile back with my groceries or whatever after leaving the train, that's not ideal.