All aboard!

A TINY scarlet hut on Auburn Avenue in Atlanta, Thelma’s Kitchen and Rib Shack, serves up world-beating catfish and grits. Demand for its grub is about to soar. The reasons why sit under a nearby bridge: four shiny new streetcars, each 80 feet (24 metres) long and capable of carrying 200 passengers, waiting for the opening, any day now, of Atlanta’s tram system. The 2.7-mile (4.3km) route will bring new commuters, customers and visitors to the district, and to Thelma’s. The area has already attracted $370m in investment since 2010.

Americans are slowly warming to public transport, and used it for a record 10.7 billion trips last year. Even those living in the South and south-west—home to some of the country’s most sprawling cities—are getting more of a taste for it. In Tucson, Arizona, Orlando, Florida and Dallas, Texas, light-rail systems have been expanded recently, according to Art Guzzetti, a vice-president of the American Public Transport Association. He reckons transport links in Charlotte, North Carolina are among the best in the country.