{"id":52349,"date":"2024-01-11T21:00:11","date_gmt":"2024-01-11T21:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=52349"},"modified":"2024-01-11T18:47:41","modified_gmt":"2024-01-11T18:47:41","slug":"blackpool-heritage-tram-tours-to-run-from-starr-gate-throughout-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=52349","title":{"rendered":"Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours to run from Starr Gate throughout 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours 2023 season finally came to an end on Saturday 6th<\/sup> January 2024 with some extra Illumination Tours (thanks to the lights being extended by a further week) having taken place in the first week of the year after which the trams which had been running since the end of September (Balloon Cars 700 and 717 and illuminated featured cars the Western Train and Frigate) started a break which is due to continue into Easter. With the uncertainty surrounding Rigby Road Depot (aka Tramtown) causing further debate an official statement has been released as an update for what plans are.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

It was announced in the autumn that Heritage Tram Tours would be taking a break after the Illuminations and this is due to be in place until Easter with the first tours of 2024 (or the 2024 season at any rate) set for 29th<\/sup> March. At the time of that statement it was said that this downtime period would be used to allow for maintenance of the trams to take place. But with Rigby Road Depot remaining closed awaiting survey results and Blackpool Transport reviewing the whole redevelopment of the wider depot complex it remained unclear just what maintenance would be possible.<\/p>\n

But now there has been a little more clarity with the latest heritage statement. To avoid anything being missed from that statement this is reproduced in full below:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe fitting shop will reopen on from Monday 8th<\/sup> January\u00a0for limited use as we commence work on the vehicles required to operate this season, however no volunteers or contractors will be able to use the fitting shop and the offices located within the fitting shop will be closed until further notice.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe tram shed will remain closed until we have the results of the conditions survey back, which we are hopeful that we will receive the results soon. Vehicle movements will be restricted and will be undertaken by BTS engineers under a SSOW to allow our engineering team to work on the fleet\u2019s maintenance programme.<\/p>\n

\u201cTramtown volunteers will not be allowed on site until the condition of the Tramshed is established. BTS welcome them to use our meeting facilities when they are available.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe archives are being moved into a safe and secure location.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe heritage operations will operate from our Starr Gate Depot for 2024.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will continue to attract, recruit and train our heritage operation volunteers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 2024 operating calendar will be announced in due course.<\/p>\n

\u201cApplication for funding of the restoration of the tram shed and the move to a Tramtown visitor attraction is continuing through the heritage lottery and other funding systems as they arise.<\/p>\n

\u201cWork on vehicles that aren\u2019t BTS which require external contractors to come on site will still not be allowed however we will be reviewing this around March once we know where our engineering team are up to with the fleet that is required to support the operation this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThank you for your continued support!\u201d<\/p>\n

The highlights from statement suggests that 2024 is likely to be a \u201clighter touch\u201d heritage operation with Starr Gate Depot only able to house a limited number of heritage cars whilst the situation with maintenance is also likely to have an impact.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Blackpool Heritage Tram Tours 2023 season finally came to an end on Saturday 6th January 2024 with some extra Illumination Tours (thanks to the lights being extended by a further week) having taken place in the first week of the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"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\/52349"}],"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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=52349"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52349\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52350,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52349\/revisions\/52350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=52349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=52349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=52349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}