Wednesday 15th October 2025 saw the first Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours to run for 10 months with the start of a brief return for the Lightpool Festival. Illumination Tours using two trams (one per night) will now run Wednesday-Sunday until Saturday 1st November 2025.
The first night saw the Illuminated Frigate, 736, used with three public tours preceded by a special invitational trip which saw Blackpool Transport Managing Director Jane Cole present to officially relaunch the heritage trams on the Prom.
736 is due to be running every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday with three tours each evening planned (1805, 1930, 2100). On Thursdays and Saturdays Balloon 717 will be doing the honours. Both trams have gone through full commissioning and extensive testing/training runs on the tramway.
As we have been used to for a number of years, tours will start from Pleasure Beach and run north to Little Bispham. After going round the loop its back south with a possible stop at North Pier and Tower for anyone who wishes to alight there and then onto Pleasure Beach where the tour will terminate.
As mentioned before and above, the return is only a brief one and after 14 nights it will all be over for another year. No decisions have been made on any plans for the future with Jane Cole quoted on BBC News as saying there will be a review after the end of these tours looking to the future although she alluded to challenges in continuing to maintain the trams.
- At the time of writing very limited tickets remain for the Illumination Tours with just spaces remaining on Thursday 23rd October (2100) and Thursday 30th October (2100). These can be booked at https://fareharbor.com/embeds/book/blackpoolheritage/items/286168/calendar/2025/10/
The Frigate back on Pleasure Beach loop again! HMS Blackpool sits ahead of its first press/invitational trip.
Jane Cole poses for photos ahead of the tram setting sail.
On-board the tram as it gets ready for departure.
We then see the tram as it departs from Pleasure Beach with its first public trip along the line.
The tram returns to Pleasure Beach with the illuminations shining across the road.
Back on the loop.
Climbing up from Gynn Square towards Cliffs Hotel with a northbound tour.
Dora the Explorer looks excited to see heritage trams back out again! 736 returns to Starr Gate Depot after its first night back in public service. (All Photographs by Steven Hughes, 15th October 2025)
Is it just me, or could Blackpool Transport not bothered to replace or fix or replace any damaged or failed bulbs?
Also noticed that photos of Balloon 717 doesn’t look like it has even had a wash since BT pulled the plug on the heritage operation last year!
Perhaps I viewed it through rose tinted spectacles, but I thought 717 looked rather smart!
Does anyone know what, if anything, is happening after 1 November? I heard Jane Cole saying on the BBC how much she loves the Heritage trams, as she has said previously, before finding another excuse for not allowing them to operate.
Of course, she then said how expensive they are to maintain. Presumably, this is the third ‘reason’ BTS have thought up.
What next? ‘I love the old trams, but BTS can’t operate them because if it rains they might get wet!!’ I jest, of course.
Or, at least, I think I do!
717 has looked filthy for a few years but its awful now, the ventral roof is black!
Everything wrong with present day Blackpool can be summed up in just 6 letters. LRVs and LEDs. Both of which may be cheap to run, but make the town dull and featureless.