To say we’ve got confused about the continued movement of Douglas Bay Horse Tramway trams around the Isle of Man would be an understatement! After the report earlier this month about trams being moved away from Strathallan Depot for off-site storage (of which it seems it may be at least slightly out of date) comes the news that two of those trams have definitely been on the move again and are now back at the depot!
What we do know this time is that Toastrack 38 and Bulkhead 43 were moved by usual hauliers JCK Limited back to Strathallan Depot on Monday 17th August 2026. Its not known exactly when they were originally moved away for off-site storage but it appears that 43 was gone by 1st July with photos of it on a lorry appearing on JCK Limited’s own Facebook page.
With the move back of these two trams it may be that the only trams recently (using hat word probably as vaguely as we can!) moved away which are still not on-site are Toastrack 12 and Bulkhead 44 (the latter of which was moved to Jurby Transport Museum in July 2026).
That leaves us with the apparent mystery of Toastrack 39. This was reported as being one of those trams which were moved for off-site storage but those who recently saw inside the depot during the Transport Festival would have seen a Toastrack under restoration which had the number 39 by it. That does seem to suggest that whilst 39 may have been off-site for storage it has been back at Strathallan for a little while.
Anyone who can provide any clarification to save the general confusion we have at the moment would be very gratefully received!
From what I understand, numbers 12, 38 and 43 were moved to off-site storage before the visit of King Charles to remove the less presentable trams from the depot. Car 44 was moved to Jurby in exchange for 22 which resumed its role as the tram shop at Derby Castle during Enthusiasts week.
I believe car 39 was a charitable donation to the Manx Electric Railway Society when the surplus trams were disposed of some time ago. This tram returned to Derby Castle earlier this year and is now under restoration, although it looks to be virtually a new tram. I assume 12 and 44 will return in due course.
This makes sense as it seems they may have cleared some space for the displays at the 150th anniversary events, also possibly made room for on-loan car no.22 of course.
Before this report appeared I did check the photographs I took on Saturday 31 July vis-a-vis those on the MERS website of the Friday 7 August events. The only significant difference I found was that the yellow fenced area at the Douglas end of Strathallan depot was occupied by car no 1 on the Saturday, whereas on Friday 7 August it was occupied by the open-sided car that appears on very close inspection to.possibly bear the number 45, as has already been mentioned. This may lend credence to the possibility that no.45 was off-site on the Saturday and somebody (I think a member of tram enthusiast public) did tell me it was off-site at the time. It doesn’t appear on any of my other Saturday photographs taken of the depot. All a bit academic now really of course but it certainly appears to look splendidly restored in the MERS photograph.
One thing I haven’t noticed in any reports was the presence of former car no 34 on the Saturday, now motorised and on rubber tyres but looking in decebt condition. At times it ran alongside the cavalcades and also appeared to.do some laps of honour in between at speeds it certainly wouldn’t have known in its years of horse haulage!