{"id":10854,"date":"2015-04-02T19:40:00","date_gmt":"2015-04-02T19:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=10854"},"modified":"2015-04-02T19:40:00","modified_gmt":"2015-04-02T19:40:00","slug":"balloon-715-goes-back-to-the-90s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=10854","title":{"rendered":"Balloon 715 goes back to the &#8217;90s!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Blackpool Heritage Trust have provided a welcome update on progress with the work to return <strong>Balloon car 715 <\/strong>to active service for use on heritage tours this year. Although work has slipped slightly behind schedule, work is progressing well, but to ensure the best possible finished job it has been decided not to launch the tram at Easter as was previously hoped. Instead, <strong>715<\/strong>&#8216;s return to service is now expected over the May Day Bank Holiday weekend.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Following months of speculation, it has finally been confirmed that <strong>715 <\/strong>has been treated to a full repaint in the 1990s style green and cream livery as worn by the majority of the Balloon cars in the not so distant past. However, apart from a few stored examples, this livery had been completely eradicated from the tramway by 2005 with all remaining operational Balloons painted in heritage, advertising or Metro Coastlines liveries &#8211; meaning that its revival on <strong>715 <\/strong>will be the first time it has graced the promenade for a decade. This should bring back many happy memories for enthusiasts of all ages, of a time when the Balloons ruled the tramway every summer.<\/p>\n<p>Besides the repaint itself, work undertaken on <strong>715 <\/strong>has been fairly extensive with the window frames stripped back to bare wood and a number of damaged panels and windows replaced. The car is now being revarnished to protect its immaculate paintwork and also requires a few other finishing touches before it can be released for traffic. Rather than rush the job, it was decided to delay its return until the next Bank Holiday weekend in early May, and it is now expected to make its debut on a tour for the Fylde Tramway Society on Saturday 2nd May. As well as performing a full system tour the tram is due to run through the modern wash plant at Starr Gate with passengers on board &#8211; a rare novelty which should add even more interest to this particular tour. A second tour is also due to run that day with <strong>Twin set 272+T2 <\/strong>during the evening, and this will complement the normal heritage service to provide what should be a most enjoyable weekend on the tramway.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_10855\" style=\"width: 970px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?attachment_id=10855\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-10855\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10855\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-10855\" title=\"715 Paint Shop\" src=\"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/715-Paint-Shop.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/715-Paint-Shop.jpg 960w, https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/715-Paint-Shop-550x412.jpg 550w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-10855\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Looking very nice indeed, Balloon 715 is seen in the Rigby Road Paint Shop in the final stages of being repainted in 1990s fleet livery. (Photo courtesy of Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours Facebook page)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Blackpool Heritage Trust have provided a welcome update on progress with the work to return Balloon car 715 to active service for use on heritage tours this year. Although work has slipped slightly behind schedule, work is progressing well, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=10854\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10854"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10854"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10854\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10858,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10854\/revisions\/10858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}