In Pictures: Harburn Hobbies becomes Harburn Halt!

Posted on Saturday 15 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

One of Edinburgh’s best known model shops – Harburn Hobbies – is ideally located by the new Trams to Newhaven extension. It can be found immediately opposite the McDonald Road tramstop and after the opening of the extension they have opened their arms to the tram and embraced it with branding in their windows as Harburn Halt!

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Tram shortage severely impacts London Tramlink

Posted on Saturday 15 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Over the past few months there have been frequent issues with tram availability on London Tramlink leading to large gaps in the service on certain routes. But it now appears that things have reached a new low as Friday 14th July has seen the bare bones of a service running – with trams only operating between Wimbledon and Beckenham Junction.

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In Pictures: Wires come down on West Midlands Metro

Posted on Friday 14 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

If you cast your minds back to those care free days before the pandemic hit and before the biggest problem on the West Midlands Metro was the cracks on the trams you will probably recall that the network suffered fairly regularly from overhead line problems. These have been few and far between in recent years but Friday 14th July saw them return, causing major disruption and a revised service being operated for much of the day.

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Tram Sunday cancelled – Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours revise planned service

Posted on Friday 14 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Fleetwood Tram Sunday 2023 has been cancelled because of the poor weather forecast for Sunday 16th July. Following the cancellation of the event Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours have confirmed that they will run a revised hop-on, hop-off timetable on the day, which will now operate to the usual timings (the same as Saturday 15th) with five tram scheduled to be in use both days.

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Picture in Time: Manx Electric Railway 2

Posted on Friday 14 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

It is time to move on with “Picture in Time” and with the Manx Electric Railway celebrating its 130th anniversary where better to go for the next few weeks than the Isle of Man? And it’s the Manx Electric Railway which is the subject of this first photo in this batch.

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In Pictures: Lucie says farewell to the East Lancashire Railway

Posted on Thursday 13 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Of the various eras of tramway operation one of the more regular ones which is little represented in the operating collections across the British Isles is that of the steam tram. There is only one fully operational standard gauge steam tram locomotive in the country and that comes from Belgium! Normally based at the North Yorkshire Moors Railway it has recently spent a period on loan across the Pennines at the East Lancashire Railway but this came to an end with a So Long Lucie event on Saturday 8th July.

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In Pictures: Trams at the East Anglia Transport Museum’s Big Bus Bash

Posted on Thursday 13 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

The East Anglia Transport Museum’s big summer event this year was the Big Bus Bash which took place for two days on Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th July. As the name probably suggests to you the focus of the weekend was buses with many resident and visiting buses in action, including trips around the local area. But we are British Trams Online so the interest in this article is the trams which were running and on the day of Kevin Bartolf’s visit there were three in service at various times.

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Supertram works this summer to see service changes

Posted on Thursday 13 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

No trams will run beyond Shalesmoor for a two week period at the end of July and start of August as rail replacement works on the Stagecoach Supertram network take place. Services will be impacted between Monday 24th July and Sunday 6th August with the work taking place in various areas in the Hillsborough and Middlewood Road areas.

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In Pictures: Edinburgh 267 in new advert

Posted on Wednesday 12 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Its been all of two weeks since we last reported on a new advert for Edinburgh Trams so it almost seems overdue for another one! This time its 267 which has received new ads with the tram now advertising the world famous Edinburgh International Festival.

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Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours gets ready for another Fleetwood Tram Sunday

Posted on Wednesday 12 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Sunday 16th July sees the return of the annual Fleetwood Tram Sunday and as part of the added events across the day – as well as the previous day – Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours will be running a number of additional tours as well as providing some static exhibits for the event.

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UKTram meet with Transport Minister

Posted on Wednesday 12 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

UKTram have recently had the chance to meet with Richard Holden, Minister at the Department for Transport with specific responsibility for light rail. In the meeting officials were able to highlight challenges faced by the sector whilst also pressing home the case for light rail growth.

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In Pictures: Dale End buildings gone in Birmingham City Centre

Posted on Tuesday 11 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

The buildings which once stood at Dale End in Birmingham City Centre and were in the way of the proposed route for the Eastside West Midlands Metro extension have now been fully demolished. Once containing a McDonald’s demolition work on the parade of buildings started in October 2022 and are now just a pile of rubble.

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Reliability and punctuality increases on NET

Posted on Tuesday 11 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

If you’ve been following the news from Nottingham Express Transit recently this statement may surprise you but a new report for the Greater Nottingham Light Rail Transit Advisory Committee has shown that both reliability and punctuality on the network has increased from the previous report. Part of the reason for this increase is that the report just covers the four months between the start of February and the end of May 2023 – before the recent high profile problems with the service (so expect the next report to have a less rosy picture).

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LRSSB praise Edinburgh Trams for successful launch of Newhaven extension

Posted on Tuesday 11 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

The Light Rail Safety Standards Board (LRSSB) has praised the work of Edinburgh Trams following the successful launch of services on the Trams to Newhaven extension in June. They worked closely with the operator ahead of the opening of the line to assess its readiness for the tram service to begin.

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Petition made to Tynwald over Douglas Bay Horse Tramway

Posted on Monday 10 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

If you have been reading British Trams Online in recent years, the saga of the will it, won’t it get back to the Sea Terminal has been hovering around the Douglas Bay Horse Tramway for quite some time. The horse tramway we see today is only running from Derby Castle as far as Broadway after a previously agreed decision to re-build it through to the Sea Terminal (albeit on a new single track formation) was reversed due to budgetary constraints. But now an ancient right of the Manx people has been exercised to try and get Tynwald to adhere to their previous decision – whether it has the desired effect remains to be seen.

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Metro service continues to suffer – leading to Stadler statement

Posted on Monday 10 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

The Tyne and Wear Metro is continuing to see regular service disruption with much of the blame for the poor service being put at the wheels of the struggling remaining original Metrocars. The peak-time extras were removed from the timetable earlier this year but even with that reduction in number of trains needed there are still frequent cancellations to services on a regular basis.

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Out and About: Tram-Trains in Sheffield City Centre

Posted on Monday 10 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Its time for another visit to the centre of Sheffield as we take a look at a couple of Tram-Trains in operation – both of which have only returned to action this year after a period out of use.

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Manchester Metrolink Then & Now: Ayres Road

Posted on Sunday 9 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

As we continue our “Then & Now” series looking at Manchester Metrolink before or during construction and then after trams started running we are back at Ayres Road.

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In Pictures: Blackpool 013 latest to receive ODAS cameras

Posted on Sunday 9 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

The continued installation of the equipment to allow the Obstacle Detection Assistance System (ODAS) to be introduced on the Blackpool Tramway has seen Flexity2 013 become the latest tram to have the camera put in.

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TfL and KeolisAmey Docklands to trial new NaviLens technology

Posted on Sunday 9 July 2023 by Gareth Prior

Four stations on the Docklands Light Railway are to be used to trial new NaviLens technology. This is an app which is designed to help blind or partially sighted customers to navigate stations and comes as part of a partnership with GoMedia (a subsidiary of Icomera) and The Royal National Institute of Blind People.

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