{"id":44,"date":"2012-03-21T19:11:52","date_gmt":"2012-03-21T19:11:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=44"},"modified":"2012-03-21T19:11:52","modified_gmt":"2012-03-21T19:11:52","slug":"christmas-comeback-for-birkenhead-trams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=44","title":{"rendered":"Christmas comeback for Birkenhead Trams"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As previously announced here on <em>British Trams Online <\/em>and elsewhere, the Birkenhead tramway is set to re-open for one day only on Saturday 17th December for the pre-arranged Santa Specials. It is planned that two trams will be operating \u2013 one of which will be reserved for use as the special \u2018Santa tram\u2019 for pre-booked visitors, whilst the other will be in normal passenger service.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The special tram will be operating departures from Woodside Ferry at 12:15, 12:45, 13:15, 13:45, 14:15 and 14:45. For a charge of \u00a34.50 per person (for both children and adults), visitors will get a return trip on the specially decorated tram and a visit to meet Santa and his helpers in his grotto. There will also be a model railway display, festive treasure hunt with the chance to win a prize, face-painting and refreshments available, including sherry for adults and something a bit more suitable for the little ones! Special family tickets for 2 adults and 2 children are also available and can be purchased online, using PayPal, from the Merseyside Tramway Preservation Society\u2019s website <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mtps.co.uk\/events.html\">here<\/a>. The single normal service tram is scheduled to operate in-between the specials detailed above, giving a departure of some sort from Woodside every 15 minutes during the afternoon.<\/p>\n<p>As the Birkenhead tramway has been forced to temporarily close \u2013 a decision prompted by the fact that the tram depot does not currently have an electrician employed \u2013 this day will provide a very welcome chance to sample the delights of this superb tramway in the winter, and hopefully this one-off operating day will be well supported by both tram enthusiasts and the general public alike. A small group of enthusiasts have already decided to combine the Birkenhead event with a visit to Manchester to ride on other vintage trams at Heaton Park, and this could make for a potentially great weekend of tram riding in the North West. Let\u2019s just hope the weather is kind, as the Merseyside preservationists<br \/>\ncould certainly use some Christmas cheer to round off what has been a rather difficult year.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Report by Andrew Waddington<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As previously announced here on British Trams Online and elsewhere, the Birkenhead tramway is set to re-open for one day only on Saturday 17th December for the pre-arranged Santa Specials. It is planned that two trams will be operating \u2013 &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=44\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44"}],"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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=44"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions\/45"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=44"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=44"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=44"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}