And another! Douglas Horse Tramway 11 arrives in Birkenhead

You’d think that one new tram arriving at the Wirral Transport Museum in a week would be enough wouldn’t you? But no, the Merseyside Tramway Preservation Society have welcomed a second horse tram from the Douglas Bay Horse Tramway with no. 11 being delivered to the Taylor Street Museum just a day after 47 arrived.

The recent history of 11 is similar to that of 47 with it most recently having been stored outside at the Jurby Transport Museum. It has been there since it was moved from Homefield Bus Garage at the end of 2009 and having last operated in 1978 it spent time at the York Road Bus Garage in Douglas, Ramsey Car Shed, Isle of Man Railway yard in Douglas and then outside of horse tram depot at Strathallan.

11 is an open toastrack which was built by Starbuck in 1886 and is the oldest tram bought new for the tramway still in existence (while 14 and 18 are older they were acquired from South Shields in 1887) which makes its long-term outside storage and seemingly unloved nature the more perplexing. It seats 32 and carries a red and white livery.

As with 47, 11 was transported across from the Isle of Man via ferry to Heysham and was then driven to Birkenhead on Wednesday 5th May with the chance taken to pose it outside the surviving buildings of Starbuck (which later became G F Milnes) where the tram was built all those years ago. After that it was on to the Wirral Transport Museum where it was unloaded and placed alongside 47. Both trams will be transferred to a large shipping container to allow for drying out and ahead of any restoration work taking place.

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