Some excellent news comes from the Beamish Museum, where the project to expand the amount of covered accommodation to railed vehicles in the main tram & bus depot has been completed after a very short time in progress.
After being planned some time ago, a fourth track was laid in the existing depot building earlier this month. The final job was pouring concrete to encase the new rails, which was carried out on Monday 19th December. Once this had been tidied-up and allowed to properly set, it was time for the very first tram to move onto the new depot track – and this honour went to Sheffield 264. Most readers of this site will probably be aware that 264
had been stored off the rails at one side of the depot building, due to the chronic shortage of space which has affected the Beamish tram fleet. This tram has been out of service for a number of years due to the poor condition of its bodywork, although it has remained operational and did occasionally appear for special events such as the 2010 ‘Power from the Past’ event, when it was posed in the Town area for a photo shoot. After being unable
to move for just over a year, this attractive open-balcony car is now back on the rails and can be shunted around the depot area once again.
Hopefully this positive development will be the start of an upturn in the fortunes of Sheffield 264 and it won’t be too long before this tram is treated to the overhaul it deserves, although this is likely to be heavily dependent on the availability of external funding. Meanwhile, the creation of more space for trams at Beamish adds to the potential for visiting trams from elsewhere to come on loan without the need for any trams to be
stabled outdoors, and perhaps ultimately could enable the home fleet to be expanded – perhaps by Gateshead 52 at some point in the future?