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Old Tram Depots still in existence


melmerby
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This is the one that started the ball rolling in the other thread Keith referred to. Great Yarmouth, the "new" Art deco front was added in the mid 1930s after the end of trams in the town but the basic building is still the original tram depot  still used as the towns bus depot. Of interest Kingsway models do a nice card kit of this bus garage

I passed this place every day last summer, when teaching in GY. I thought it was a rather grand building, just for buses. The building next door is very 1930's and I think is dated: was that a ticket office, or waiting room?

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There's a restaurant in Saltaire (Bradford) that's called   The Old Tramshed. It's in what I onow was a trolleybus depot but I'm not sure if it was actually a tram shed.

 

Jamie

Edited by jamie92208
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A few more I am aware of in the West Midlands (or is it Greater Birmingham now?)

 

Bilston, opposite the Library and Craft Gallery on Mount Pleasant Bilston

 

The Fish depot at Amblecoat Stourbridge, now Laser Quest

 

Washward Heath Depot, where Birmingham's last Fleetline was roped in. Now clad over as an ethnic supermarket but still there underneath.

 

Kings Heath Car sheds,  from steam tram days, the steam depot has gone but International Stock in Silver St is the Car Shed, you will need to go inside to see its history that its not a new structure.

 

Just as a quick note the Aston Manor car Sheds that used to be the museum until Birmingham city councils money grabbing F*** up still has the steam tram loco sheds and yards next door that are used as a car garage.

 

Hockley, now the new Bingley Hall, While it was still a bus garage you could still make out where the return wheel was for the Birmingham cable car, building has now been clad over so again history has been hidden.

Hope that helps the list

 

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A few more I am aware of in the West Midlands (or is it Greater Birmingham now?)

 

Bilston, opposite the Library and Craft Gallery on Mount Pleasant Bilston

 

The Fish depot at Amblecoat Stourbridge, now Laser Quest

 

Washward Heath Depot, where Birmingham's last Fleetline was roped in. Now clad over as an ethnic supermarket but still there underneath.

 

Kings Heath Car sheds,  from steam tram days, the steam depot has gone but International Stock in Silver St is the Car Shed, you will need to go inside to see its history that its not a new structure.

 

Just as a quick note the Aston Manor car Sheds that used to be the museum until Birmingham city councils money grabbing F*** up still has the steam tram loco sheds and yards next door that are used as a car garage.

 

Hockley, now the new Bingley Hall, While it was still a bus garage you could still make out where the return wheel was for the Birmingham cable car, building has now been clad over so again history has been hidden.

Hope that helps the list

Excellent.

Some I had heard of others not.

 

Washwood Heath depot had the distinction of also being a trolley bus depot, but not on a trolley bus route!

The trolley buses for the Nechells routes had to travel along Saltley Road and Washwood Heath road via a tram route to the depot with one pole down and the return current via a skate in the tram track towed behind the bus!

There wasn't even any extra wiring in the depot although there was a triangle for turning.

The same situation applied if they needed to get to Kyott's Lake Road works, as it did to the Trollies from the Coventry Road routes, although their depot was fully wired.

Birmingham's two trolley bus routes were not connected to each other either.

Birmingham whilst being the first in Britain to replace a tram route with a trolley bus, never really took to them which they considered more to be a Railless tram, not an electric bus!.

The trams outlived the trolleybuses in Birmingham by a couple of years, the only ones in Britain to do so.

 

Keith

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The current Oldham Depot, now owned by First Group was never a tram depot as I first thought and Red Devil was correct. I had mistaken the entrance of the old tram depot for that of the new bus depot in a photograph, having checked the book on Oldham Trams I realise my mistake.

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A few more I am aware of in the West Midlands (or is it Greater Birmingham now?)

 

 

Hockley, now the new Bingley Hall, While it was still a bus garage you could still make out where the return wheel was for the Birmingham cable car, building has now been clad over so again history has been hidden.

Hope that helps the list

My Dad worked at Hockley in the Inspectors Office from 1939 to 1942.

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Pretty sure this bar on Corsica St just off Highbury Corner is an ex-tram depot. 

 

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@51.546229,-0.102066,3a,75y,67.61h,79.27t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1soPrGRB1kkP3Kc4IUzg9-lw!2e0

 

When I lived in the area it was called the Tramshed

 

When I grew up in Highbury the track was still visible (early sixties) some cars laid over there to start the morning services apparently.

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Three tramsheds in Aberdeen still extant.

 

Aberrdeen

 

The one down at the Links is now the Satrosphere Science Exhibition: http://www.privatehousestays.com/l/Attractions/Satrosphere  Nice cafe there.

The Market Street one is now offices/cafe/gallery and, it would appear apartments to let: http://www.british-towns.net/scotland/north-east/aberdeen/aberdeen/aberdeen-apartments.  (apologies for the useless photo but its the only one I could find and it shows only the very edge of the tramshed.

 

The one at Queens Cross was transformed into Grampian Television (now Scottish Television) and  though there are still rails etc on the ground inside (at least there were when i last visited twenty years ago) it is nigh on impossible to see anything of the old tramshed now: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grampian_Television

 

Headquarters at King Street now is FirstBus HQ and the tram sheds were demolished 5 or so years ago.  Here is a short video:

The frontage of the original barracks behind which the tramshed was is still there thoiugh.
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There are other bits and bobs around the black country I did not mention.

 

Perry Park Road in Old Hill is possibly one of the largest Tramway earth works in the UK its a massive reverse curve climbing many feet, to avoid Waterfall Lane. A massive but short lived section of the route to Blackheath.

 

On the corner of Reddal Hill Road and Halesowen Road is the former bank building the last two window bays of the building is the Tramway Waiting Room.

 

While on the Dudley System, at the junction of Hungary Hill and Birmingham street is another odd little brick building with a bus shelter on the foot path, the brick building is another former tram waiting room for the Lye route.

 

Not quite tramway but I wonder if the Guided Buses Only sign is still up at the end of Streetly Road, Erdington, I haven't been past for a year or two, but was always amazed it was still there and not in someones collection, having been liberated one night!

 

Andy

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Sorry to add some more!

 

Walsall Depot, looks like the Tram shed may still be there, now as an industrial Estate since West Midlands travel shut it as a garage.

 

and a gem of the West Midlands, The 'South Staffordshire Electric Tramways Generating Station' on the Darlaston Road, Pleck, Walsall, for many years the Chateau Pleck wine merchants, which always made me smile when passing the sign on the M6 if you know 'the Pleck' its main claim to fame are the Gas works and the young ladys who stood on the street corners around it!

 

I think that's my west midlands tram relic knowledge exhausted for a bit, although it keeps appearing out of the ground when road works are going on, I noticed quite a bit coming to light when the A38/Longbridge Lane junction was being done a couple of years back.

 

Andy 

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I haven't looked recently but the Rothwell depot of the West Riding Tramways system is still in existence at the junction of Wood Lane and the A61 just south of Leeds.  It closed in I think 1933 and was on the route from Thwaite Gate (The south eastern extremity of the Leeds system) to Wakefield via Lofthouse.

 

Jamie

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Not quite tramway but I wonder if the Guided Buses Only sign is still up at the end of Streetly Road, Erdington, I haven't been past for a year or two, but was always amazed it was still there and not in someones collection, having been liberated one night!

 

Andy

Where Birmingham leads, others foolishly follow! (re Cambridge etc.)

 

Keith

 

EDIT: there used to be a few remnants of the Kinver Light Railway still extant a few years ago. Not sure of the situation these days

Edited by melmerby
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There is the 'tram and social' in tooting, which claims it was once a Tramshed, it's certainly believable.

 

This school in Richmond was once a tram depot, before becoming a fire station, then an arts/community centre;

 

https://www.google.co.uk/maps?q=Richmond&ll=51.465678,-0.298862&spn=0.00913,0.024397&t=m&hnear=Richmond,+Greater+London,+United+Kingdom&z=16&layer=c&cbll=51.465622,-0.298941&panoid=3EtqSrYy5fT1ZDU91a57LA&cbp=12,312.14,,0,-3.26

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There are two buildings in Batley that were built as tram depots.  One on Bradrford Road that was actually used as such then became  a wool warehouse tnhat the other on Clark Road that was built as a tram depot but never used and became a fire station instead.

 

Jamie

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Excellent stuff!

 

Looks to me like someone should write a book on this, I had no idea there were so many surviving tram depots around the country.

 

A good topic for a Shire Book on Old Tram Depots perhaps? http://www.shirebooks.co.uk/Motoring_and_Road_tr/

 

Could be my retirement project... though by 2035 either someone'll written it or the surviving depots will have become just a handful.

 

Seriously, this is our industrial heritage and we ought to keep an eye on it before more old depots bite the dust.

 

cheers,

 

Keith

 

 

 

 

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Excellent stuff!

 

Looks to me like someone should write a book on this, I had no idea there were so many surviving tram depots around the country.

 

A good topic for a Shire Book on Old Tram Depots perhaps? http://www.shirebooks.co.uk/Motoring_and_Road_tr/

 

Could be my retirement project... though by 2035 either someone'll written it or the surviving depots will have become just a handful.

 

Seriously, this is our industrial heritage and we ought to keep an eye on it before more old depots bite the dust.

 

cheers,

 

Keith

The Light Rail Transit Association has its own publishing department, perhaps they would be interested? 

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