You turn away your attention from the West Midlands Metro for 30 seconds and another tram arrives! 49 is the latest Urbos100 to have made the trip from Spain with it turning up at Wednesbury Depot on Tuesday 6th June – the fourth delivery in the past month including one a week for the past three weeks!
The arrival of 49 certainly solves the mystery of a few weeks ago where there were some who thought it had arrived whereas there had been no confirmed sightings of it having been delivered. Either it was delivered and was just driven around the block to be redelivered it would appear to be definite that it was only passed over to the West Midlands Metro on Tuesday 6th June 2023.
With 50 (the last delivery) being the sixteenth Urbos100 to be delivered, 49 must be the seventeenth and means that the class has overtaken the number of T69s (which totalled 16) although hasn’t yet reached the size of the Urbos3s. It also neatly fills in a gap of tram as it does now mean that 38–51 are all at Wednesbury as well as 53, 56 and 57.
Seventeen down, five to go!
49 arrives at Wednesbury, its new home.
Another look at 49 as it comes to the end of its long road trip.
Discussions take place before the tram makes the final move to the depot and is unloaded. (All Photographs by Michael Morton, 6th June 2023)
- Video of the delivery is also available from Podbaba Transport on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCeO1pGYtX8
The delivery of 4 trams within the space of a month seems to be good news as it can mean Midland Metro can do a six minute service between Birmingham and Wolverhampton.
But the turn around is shocking and we all know what CAF stands for when it comes to workman.
It will be shocking if years down the line the trams aren’t pulled yet again due to more cracks.