section_path: History/New technologies
section_name: New technologies
paragraph_text: New technologies
  
  Even as steam locomotive technology continued to improve, inventors in Germany started work on alternative methods for powering trains. Werner von Siemens built the first train powered by electricity in 1879, and went on to pioneer electric trams. Another German inventor, Rudolf Diesel, constructed the first diesel engine in the 1890s, though the potential of his invention to power trains was not realized until decades later. Between 1897 and 1903, tests of experimental electric locomotives on the Royal Prussian Military Railway in Germany demonstrated they were viable, setting speed records in excess of 160 kilometers per hour (100 mph).
  
  Early gas powered " doodlebug " self-propelled railcars entered service on railroads in the first decade of the 1900s. Experimentation with diesel and gas power continued, culminating in the German " Flying Hamburger " in 1933, and the influential American EMD FT in 1939. These successful diesel locomotives showed that diesel power was superior to steam, due to lower costs, ease of maintenance, and better reliability. Meanwhile, Italy developed an extensive network of electric trains during the first decades of the 20th century, driven by that country's lack of significant coal reserves.