Forty years on and can the trolleybus make a return?

Jul 10 2008 by Andrew Baldwin, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

Huddersfield’s last trolleybus ran in 1968. ANDREW BALDWIN looks at the possibility of a comeback for the vehicles in the town

THOUSANDS of people turned out to say farewell to Huddersfield’s beloved trolleybuses 40 years ago this Sunday.

Crowds stood four deep in Westgate and Kirkgate as the last of the distinctive red and cream buses came through the town centre.

The very last one travelled to Waterloo, through town to Outlane and then back to St George’s Square.

And then it was all over.

What had been one of Britain’s largest trolleybus systems, built up between 1933 and 1940, was no more.

It embraced 140 vehicles and 40 miles of route and extended as far as Brighouse, Marsden and West Vale.

But just 20 buses and routes to Lindley, Outlane and West Vale remained by the time of closure in 1968.

Less than four years later the trolleybus was extinct in Britain, with the closure of the Bradford system.

These days the few survivors are relegated to transport museums, lovingly cared for by enthusiasts and with a significant proportion of the population not even knowing what they were.

But could they be making a comeback?

They’ve never gone away in many parts of the world, being used day in, day out in nearly 400 cities and towns, including Geneva, Seattle, Vancouver, Athens, Beijing and Rome. Now it could be possible that Leeds will be the first city to re-introduce trolleybuses in Britain the 21st century.

One man who certainly hopes so is Huddersfield enthusiast David Smithies, who has travelled on the system in Lyon, France.

He says: “They are pollution-free, nearly noiseless and effortlessly climb gradients. You couldn’t help thinking why we scrapped our trolleybuses.”

Put simply, the trolleybus is an electric bus powered from two overhead lines, from which it draws power using two poles fixed to the top of the vehicle.

Unlike trams, they have rubber tyres and run on the road like conventional buses.

They were hugely popular, but were gradually phased out due to cheap oil prices which existed between the 1920s and the early 1970s.

Times have changed; we’re now more aware of the environment and we realise that trolleybuses are clean and green.

One big plus is that they are more economical to run than diesel buses.

They’ve also moved on a stage from the old days and have all the comfort and ease demanded by modern passengers, including low floor access.

In central Rome the trolleybuses can leave the overhead wires to get round roadworks and traffic incidents.

The batteries are re-charged during normal running under wires.

In Geneva the latest vehicles can carry 200 passengers.

So could Britain at last latch on to what they have on the Continent?

The scheme on the drawing board for Leeds secured the cash backing of the Regional Transport Board at a meeting last year and is waiting to be approved by the Government’s Transport Department.

A proposed 20-kilometre trolleybus network is based upon three routes in the city and would cost £300m.

Work on the scheme could start in 2011/12, with completion of the network in 2014/15.

Metro is proposing a north route through Headingley and out to a park-and-ride facility at Lawnswood; a south route to a park-and-ride at Stourton, near the M1/M621/A1; and an eastern route that would include St James’s Hospital.

Flexibility would be built in for extensions to other areas.

Metro director general Kieran Preston says: “Gaining the Regional Transport Board’s financial backing is a huge step forward in our plans to develop what will be the UK’s first new trolleybus system in Leeds.

“It means we have an agreed funding source, which combined with the Transport Department’s acceptance of our business case could mean phased completion of a state-of-the-art trolleybus system by 2014.”

Back in Huddersfield in 1968 longest-serving driver C P Jones was in charge on the last trip.

He had been driving trolleybuses for 21 years and the journey marked his retirement.

Dignitaries including the Mayor of Huddersfield, Alderman Tom Cliffe, were passengers in specially-decorated trolleybus No 623.

It was a sad day for bystanders who lined the route, many of them waving Union Jacks.

One man who was there said: “The trolleys were quiet, quick, clean, well-ventilated and free of vibrations.

“Above all, they were very different. They were big, strong, sleek, interesting and, above all, ours.”

l The Trolleybus Museum at Sandtoft, near Doncaster, has a special weekend of events this Saturday and Sunday to mark the anniversary of the end of the trolleybus operations in Huddersfield.