The Heaton Park Tramway will be celebrating the 125th anniversary of the opening of Stockport’s electric tram network with a special event on Sunday 30th August 2026.
Heaton Park is the home of the only surviving electric Stockport tram, open-topper 5, and so it seems appropriate that they will be the centre of these celebrations. It was 26th August 1901 that the first electric trams ran in Stockport, and one of those first trams was 5 which was built for the opening of the network.
By the time they stopped running in August 1951 it was the last remaining traditional tram operation in Greater Manchester and it would be almost 30 years before a traditional tram ran in the region again with the opening of the Heaton Park Tramway!
On Sunday 30th August 2026 5 will be on display at Middleton Road tram museum and it will be joined by a display of Stockport buses (from the Greater Manchester Transport Society). The buses will include one of those introduced to replace the trams in 1951.
There will be vintage buses linking the tramway and the Greater Manchester Museum of Transport, and its also hoped that there may be a number of vintage bus tours running from Heaton Park during the day.
If you like your trams in miniature then you will also be in luck as here will be a full lineup of model Stockport trams courtesy of Ashley Best and Greg Marsden.
There will be a number of exhibits from Heaton Park’s own archives as well as historic images of the trams in service over half a century.
The event takes place on Sunday 30th August between 1100 and 1630.
The operating tramway at Heaton Park remains closed with work still required to complete repairs on the substation. It probably doesn’t need saying but as soon as there is news on that it will be reported on the tramway’s official online sources as well as these pages!
In preparation for the event Stockport 5 was moved from Lakeside Depot to the Middleton Road museum (it swapped places with Hull 96). Its seen here pausing on its way at Whitegate.
Getting a wash outside Middleton Road before being moved inside once again.
In order to move Stockport 5, the top deck of Bury 7 had to be moved. In this photo we see it sitting on its accommodation trolley. Plans are afoot for 7 to be displayed from next year. (All Photographs courtesy of Heaton Park Tramway, 12th August 2026)
May I ask how 5 was moved if the power supply is out of use? This seems rather akin to the Blackpool situation: display a couple of trams but keep postponing any chance of restoring the service in the hope that we enthusiasts will pass into our next life first.
96 and 5 were hauled both ways by suitable road vehicles.
The substation project is actively progressing through the various stages by MCC with substantial funding in place and being used.
While the power supply isn’t under our control the volunteers have been actively maintaining the rest of the fleet, overhead and P-way throughout the closure, including working with contractors to replace significant lengths of rail ensuring we can restart services at the earliest opportunity.
Events like this are being done to demonstrate the tramway and museum is still here and active to the local and enthusiast community.
According to a member to whom I spoke at the last open day, MTMS are waiting upon an official date for the work to be commenced. This is not anything over which they have any control.
I believe that the cars are towed in and out by a motor vehicle.
Either a very long extension lead, or the landrover parked just on the edge of the pic
🙂
As any regular reader of this site will know, understand, and appreciate; the MTMS have been very open with information and service will resume but timescales are entirely in the hands of the council electrical contractors…
So why can the council’s contractor not set a finish date? I do realise that in the transport world such dates are rarely adhered to, but this would give us all something to hope for.
They can’t set a finish date for a job not physically started because people will just whinge when it inevitably moves.
I gather that it isn’t quite so simple. After the work is completed, the volunteers will need to undergo a process of re-training.