Preserved Tramcars in Britain

The earliest tramcars were horse-drawn and originated during the Victorian era, a large portion of them eventually being replaced with electric vehicles (which themselves were phased out or replaced by trolleybuses). A number of these tramcars have been restored and preserved and continue to be run by museums all around the world, with a significant number based in Britain. Several tramcar bodies were sold to farmers and other individuals when the systems they were running on closed down. These bodies were used for a variety of purposes – chicken houses, lambing pens and houses or holiday homes. Many have since been recovered and restored and often returned to their original condition and are running once again at heritage sites. Royston Morris’ vibrant images feature a fascinating selection of tramcars that have been preserved (in one form or another) and can be seen across the country.

Author Biography

Royston has been interested in transport since early childhood, when he was always playing with toy cars, lorries and buses. In 1975 he became interested in trains and got his first camera as a birthday present. Since then, he has combined his two main hobbies of transport and photography and has taken over 30,000 transport-related images, featuring cars, trains, commercial vehicles, bicycles, aircraft, hot air balloons and horse-drawn vehicles. He is still taking photographs fifty years on and has a Flickr site which is regularly updated.