Full schedule revealed for Crich Enthusiast’s Day

With just a few days to go until the annual Enthusiast’s Day is held at Crich Tramway Village on Saturday 14th September, it is pleasing to announce that a more detailed schedule of the day’s activities has now been published on the museum’s website. Although unlikely to scale the dizzying heights of last year’s Glasgow-themed event which featured such highlights as the return to service of Glasgow 1282 and a memorable line-up of Glasgow trams, there should still be plenty going on to keep regular visitors entertained throughout the day.

It is intended to have all sixteen operational passenger trams in service across the day, but presumably due to the all-too-common shortage of crews it will not be possible to run them all at once, and therefore crews will have to change cars part way through the day. Subject to availability and weather, it is planned to use Glasgow 22, Sheffield 74, Leeds 345, Berlin 3006 and Blackpool cars 40, 166, 167 and 236 in the morning. These will be replaced by eight different trams in the afternoon when Chesterfield 7, LUT 159, Leeds 180, Leeds 399, Blackpool 630, Glasgow 812, Glasgow 1068 and London 1622 should be running.

There will also be a sale of surplus books and journals in the Exhibition Hall, as well as a number of different photo opportunities taking place during the event, kicking off with ‘Little & Large’ – Sheffield horse tram 15 posed next to the biggest tram in the national collection, Blackpool Jubilee car 762. This will be followed by a London line-up at around 10:30am, a slightly surprising addition to this event as a London weekend was held at Crich just two months ago. However, this should feature a very rare appearance in daylight by London Transport 1 which is likely to be one of its last in its current condition, with work on the reconstruction of this unique tram expected to commence shortly. Presumably once extracted from the Exhibition Hall, the car will be stored elsewhere to await its turn in the workshop.

A further ‘surprise’ photo opportunity at 12:30 will see another tram extracted from the Exhibition Hall and displayed outside, and finally, the previously announced display of horse trams on the depot fan will take place between 2:30 and 4:00pm. It has also now been confirmed that the new arrival, Leeds 107, will be able to take part in this event. This had initially been ruled out due to ‘ongoing external investigations’ (presumably connected with the unfortunate accident during its launch event at Middleton last month), but happily permission has now been granted for the tram to be placed on ‘limited display’ during the afternoon, whatever that means. This will give many people their first opportunity to have a good look at this superbly restored horse car and will hopefully encourage a few extra people to visit.

Despite some niggles, the Enthusiast’s Day is always an event well worth attending and hopefully the 2013 event will be no exception. It must be remembered however, that all advertised events and vehicles are subject to change and the weather may well lead to changes to the above programme of events. Hopefully whether or not the sun shines, the event will be a good one and Crich will be rewarded with healthy attendance figures to boost what has been a rather disappointing season in terms of visitor numbers.

A rare shot of London Transport 1 posed on the depot fan during a previous event at Crich. This scene should be repeated on Saturday, possibly for the last time before the car is stripped for rebuilding to fully operational condition in its original blue livery. (Photo by Tony Waddington)

 

 

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4 Responses to Full schedule revealed for Crich Enthusiast’s Day

  1. Tommy Carr says:

    I’m not an expert, but why does 107 need to be confined to the workshops? It’s only moving forwarda few yards-it can’t be that hard!

  2. Nigel Pennick says:

    When LCC 1 is reconstructed, will it be allowed to have its original slogan “Tramcars provide Comfort for Reading and Smoking” written on the side? Or will history be altered to make it PC?

  3. Geoff says:

    This will probably be greeted by cries of ‘pedant’, but I trust that there will be more than one enthusiast present at “Enthusiasts’ Day”.

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