We see the remains of the city’s most elegant transport system all over the shop, but why did the trams disappear?
As we are the UK’s flattest city with not a hill in sight, you might think that having a tram system here would make perfect sense. However, while Manchester, Sheffield and Nottingham have all revived theirs in recent years, we sadly retired ours in 1945 and have never seriously thought about bringing it back ever since. Instead, all that remains of what was probably the most elegant form of public transport ever to grace Hull’s streets are a few museum exhibits, a couple of old tram depots now converted into new uses and a short stretch of track disappearing from view down an alleyway off Anlaby Road.
Hull’s first all-electric trams made their debut on 5 July 1899, running on two routes to and from the city centre along Hessle Road and Anlaby Road. Until then, people got around the city using horse-drawn transport with the exception of a steam-powered tram service which ran on Hedon Road. Tram lines were first laid in the mid-1870s. The nine miles of single-line tracks and passing loops were used by horse-drawn trams until 1889 when the short-lived Drypool and Marfleet Steam Tram Company opened a 1.3m tramway for steam-powered trams to ferry workers to and from Alexandra Dock.
Both the steam tram company and a separate firm operating the horse-drawn trams were eventually acquired by Hull Corporation ahead of the launch of its ambitious municipally-owned electric tram service. Parliamentary consent and £300,000 in loans to fund construction work were also secured by the Corporation before its first trams went into service. Within a year, lines along Holderness Road, Beverley Road and Spring Bank with an extension along Princes Avenue had been added.
The rails were supplied by a Belgian company while the electrical equipment was made by German firm Siemens who, more than a century later, would return to Hull to develop an offshore wind turbine blade manufacturing facility in Alexandra Dock. The design of the Belgian rails differed from those used in many other cities and were said to give a smoother ride, particularly over Hull’s many railway level crossings.
A specially-built power station in Osborne Street initially provided electricity for the network and although it closed in 1930 the building still stands today and is used as a warehouse. After its closure, electricity was supplied by the Corporation’s huge coal-fired power station in Sculcoates.
At its peak, Hull’s tram service featured 180 vehicles and 21 miles of line but by the mid-1930s trams began to be replaced by trolley buses and motor buses and the final tram – illuminated by 800 lightbulbs to mark the occasion – completed its last journey on 30 June 1945. Beyond the Streetlife Museum and a couple of buildings, the legacy of the network can still be seen on some sections of Hull’s main roads where the trams once ran down the middle of what are now long grassed central reservations.
Significantly, the trams also marked a shift in attitudes towards working women. Until the start of the First World War in 1914, the workforce at Hull Corporation Tramways was all-male. However, once the war started women were recruited to replace men who had joined the armed forces. Initially, women worked as conductresses but were later also employed as drivers and inspectors.
by Angus Young