Heaton Park 7, also known as Blackpool Replica Vanguard 619, was involved in an unfortunate incident at the Heaton Park Tramway in Manchester on Bank Holiday Monday, 6th May during a routine shunting procedure. The tram left the rails at the Middleton Road end of the tramway, resulting in it partly blocking the nearby road.
At present, 7 is stabled outside the tram depot at the park and has to be moved out of the way each day when the tramway is open, to allow the service cars to leave the depot. On this day, 7 was parked up with its handbrake on and chocks placed on the wheels as usual. Unfortunately, at the end of the day when the time came for the tram to be put back away, it was discovered that the brakes had become defective, and the car began to roll once the chocks had been removed. All attempts to halt 7‘s progress failed and the tram ended up forcing the park gates open, and coming to the rest at the edge of Middleton Road. Although the front bogie straddled the duel carriageway, the rear bogie remained securely on the rails. Thankfully nobody was hurt and no vehicles or pedestrians were passing at the time when 7 attempted to leave the park, whilst the tram escaped with only a few scratches as a reminder of its misadventure.
The Railway Accident Investigation Bureau were immediately contacted, as is standard procedure for any incidents such as this, and once permission had been granted to remove the tram from the scene it was dragged back onto the track and secured in position. It is unfortunate that a photograph taken of the tram whilst it was waiting to be re-railed has subsequently been published in the local press, and is so common of the media the story has been somewhat blown out of proportion.
A Railway Inspector has since visited the park, and went away satisfied that this was a freak incident which does not reflect adversely on the safety strategies of the Heaton Park Tramway. However, the operators of the line are obviously keen to ensure that no incident like this ever happens again, and so their safety procedures will be reviewed accordingly whilst car 7 is to be subjected to a thorough examination. HM Railway Inspectorate and the Health & Safety department of Manchester City Council will also be consulted so that revised policies can be drawn up. Whilst this is obviously not the kind of publicity the tramway would like at this time, it is important to remember that accidents do occasionally happen and this applies to ALL tramways, and indeed railways and other forms of transport.
As regards the newspaper blowing the incident up out of proportion, I didn’t see the offending article, but we have to bear in mind that it fortunately happened when there was no road traffic passing. Middleton Road is a very busy thoroughfare and if 7 had struck a car or a driver had swerved to avoid it and been in collision with another vehicle the outcome could have been very different. Fortunately RAIB and HMRI have seen it for what it is, namely a freak accident, and I have no doubt whatsoever that MTMS will be taking it very seriously.
On a lighter note, I wonder would the explanation on a car driver’s insurance claim form turn out to be an insurance company’s ‘favourite’, along the lines of ‘a tram jumped out in front of me’?