Picture in Time today returns to Blackpool as we take a look at Brush Railcoach 636 at a time when it carried a livery styled on the wartime green and cream in 1992.
636, which entered service in September 1937, had first received the wartime colours in 1989 and at the time of this photo was carrying side panel adverts for the Carlton Hotel but still retained the full effect of the popular mainly green livery. When originally entering service the tram was numbered as 299 and it carried twin destination screens but these were replaced by the single indicator we now know during 1959. It carried a trolley all the way up until 1990 when it succumbed to the fitting of a pantograph. As the years went on 636 was to be the only Brush Car to receive Metro Coastlines livery when it received the attractive dark green and yellow variant but in 2004 the axe came down for the tram as a passenger vehicle. It was subsequently acquired by SET of Derby who have used the tram as a test bed for experimental equipment and this included a period of test running back on its tramway during the winter of 2009. Following this it was back to Derby where it remains today.
Both images of the tram show 636 in Fleetwood. The first is as the tram pulls out of Pharos Street on 13th June 1992.
And then later on the day 636 is to be found at the old Fleetwood Ferry stop on the Esplanade.
Both Photographs by Ralph Oakes-Garnett