Nantes was no different from almost all French cities when it decided to scrap its trams in the 1950s and on January 25th, 1958 the last of the city's "first-generation" systems closed. It may seem that today Nantes is no different to many other French cities by having a tramway - but the historical capital of Brittany and current administrative centre of the pays de la Loire region was the pioneer in re-introducing modern tramways in the 1980s. The establishment of the SEMITAN organisation to coordinate public transport in Nantes and its surrounding self-coverning communities in 1978 came shortly before plans to build afresh were confirmed and work started at the end of 1981 on the eastern branch of what is now line 1 - alongside a goods rail line from the main station to Haluchere. It was not without controversy. At one stage a newly elected mayor pledged to stop all work and even rip up the tracks which were already laid, but this eventually came to nothing and work proceeded so that the eastern branch of Line 1 opened in January 1985 from Commerce, in the city centre, to Haluchere, a distance of 5.8 km. During the following month, the western branch which followed an entirely street-based alignment opened to Bellevue.

Throughout the 1960s and 1970s France had been restricted to single line routes in Marseille, St Etienne and Lille (one line with two branches at the outer end) and had no indigenous rolling-stock industry. GEC Alsthom, now known as Alstom and one of the world's most successful tram makers with its "Citadis" design, and based at La Rochelle, not far from Nantes, entered the market with 28 six-axle single articulated trams for Nantes, eyeing future sales as other French cities monitored developments in Nantes with a view to following suit. This tram design was soon to become obsolete as low-floor technology swept across the tram building scene, but when Nantes came to order more trams for its second line, it remained with the original design but with a low-floor centre section for trams 329-340. At the same time, low-floor centre sections were fitted to the original batch, primarily to improve accessibility but also to improve capacity. Line 1 was becoming so well patronised that cars were having to run at times in coupled units.

Line 2 opened in September 1992 from Commerce, in the city centre, where interchange with Line 1 was possibile, to Trocardiere in the community of Reze to the south-west, where a second depot was built (the first being at Hopital Bellier on the eastern branch of Line 1). Shorty afterwards, line 2 was extended northwards along the Cours des 50 Otages, to the same named tram stop with an additional stop at Place du Cirque. In September 1993, Line 2 was extended into the northern part of the city on a street-based alignment as far as Ecole Centrale-Sup de Co, before reaching its current terminus at Orvault Grand Val the following year.

The success of routes 1 and 2 made further expansion possible : In August 2000 a completely new line, line 3 from the city centre to Plaisance in the north-west was inaugurated, and Line 1 extended in the west from Romanet (at the city boundary) into newly developing areas in St Herblain, terminating at a new stop named Francois Mitterand after the late president of France. The opportunity was also taken to divert the route slighty before reaching Romanet by better serving the densely populated area around Place Mendes-France. More lines meant more trams being needed. There was no doubt that Nantes would opt for a 100% low floor design and in June of 2000, the first delivery of a new design by ADtranz, the "Incentro", took place. Perhaps surprisingly, Nantes did not return to Alstom for its new trams, preferring a product built in Nurnberg, Germany by a company which strong market connections in Germany, but had been active in France with Strasbourg as a customer..

Line 3 shares part of its track with route 2 in the city centre, with platforms at Commerce and Hotel Dieu being used by both. A central track just to the south of Hotel Dieu tram stop allows the double-ended cars (almost always Incentros on route 3) to reverse. It was always intended to extend tram line 3 and by 2003 it reached Sillon de Bretagne in the north-west adding a further 2.1 km to the network, which remains France's most extensive. Route 2, originally terminating at Trocardiere, now passes through Le Couets to a new tram/bus interchange at Neustrie on a 1.8 km extension. To the south-west, the one area not now served by trams, plans were in place for more rails but these have been put back whilst Nantes completes a new Ligne 4 which has been designated a "BusWay". This 8 km long line will run from Place Foch, close to Duchesse Anne, where there will be interchange with tram line 1, to Porte de Vertou. A second "high-capacity" route will thus be created across the Loire, this time on Avenue Carnot and Bouldevard C de Gaulle.

Other tram extensions will no doubt take place as the service is seen as extremely successful. Trams run every three minutes at peak hours and every 5 to 6 minutes at other times during the day and evening services are frequent. Trams even run throughout the night. Despite such frequent services, loadings are good, often too good for comfort reflecting the populariy of the tramway in the areas it serves. Graet care has been taken to fit the trams intotheir environments - on segregated track, often grassed reservation, with level access to the vehicles on traffic-calmed roads with numerous car parks provided for drivers to leave their vehicles and continue to the city centre by tram. The large numbers transported by trams also helps to ease road congestion in the city, which does appear to be less than in most European cities of comparable size.

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