Wolverhampton District Electric Tramways Company

Wolverhampton District Electric Tramways Company
	Car 34 preserved at the Black Country Living Museum
Operation
Locale	Dudley, Wolverhampton
Open	22 April 1899
Close	31 August 1928
Status	Closed
Infrastructure
Track gauge	3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm)
Propulsion system(s)	Electric
Depot(s)	Mount Pleasant, Bilston
Statistics
Route length	14.67 miles (23.61 km)

Last updated May 05, 2019

The Wolverhampton District Electric Tramways Company operated an electric tramway service between Dudley and Wolverhampton between 1899 and 1928.^[1]

Dudley is a large town in the county of West Midlands, England, 6 miles (9.7 km) south-east of Wolverhampton and 10.5 miles (16.9 km) north-west of Birmingham. The town is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley and in 2011 had a population of 79,379. The Metropolitan Borough, which includes the towns of Stourbridge and Halesowen, had a population of 312,900. Dudley is sometimes called the capital of the Black Country.

Wolverhampton is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands, England. At the 2011 census, it had a population of 249,470. The demonym for people from the city is 'Wulfrunian'.

History

On 22 April 1899 British Electric Traction purchased the assets of the Dudley and Wolverhampton Tramways Company. The Dudley and Wolverhampton Tramways Order of 1899 authorised rebuilding and electrification and the first section between Dudley and Sedgley opened on 3 October 1900, and the remaining section from Sedgley to the Wolverhampton boundary at the Fighting Cocks on 9 January 1902.

British Electric Traction Company Limited, renamed BET plc in 1985, was a large British industrial conglomerate. It was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index but was acquired by Rentokil in 1996, and the merged company is now known as Rentokil Initial.

The route from Dudley to Sedgley section was worked by tramcars from the Dudley, Stourbridge and District Electric Traction Company. The line between Sedgley and the Fighting Cocks (on the Wolverhampton boundary) remained steam operated until 1902.

The Dudley, Stourbridge and District Electric Tramways Company operated an electric tramway service between Dudley and Stourbridge and also other lines in the neighbourhood between 1899 and 1930.

On 1 May 1900, the Wolverhampton District Electric Tramways Company purchased the assets of the Bilston and District Tramways from British Electric Traction. The newly electrified line to Dudley was transferred to the new Company, on 1 February 1901.

Electric services began as follows:

14 July 1902 Stow Heath Lane to Moxley via Bilston, and the Fighting Cocks to Bilston
15 July 1902 Bilston to Willenhall.
August 1902 Bilston to Bradley
6 November 1902 Deans Road to Willenhall
6 December 1902 Willenhall to Darlaston
15 December 1902 extension to Bull Stake

The offices, a transformer station and the repair and paint shop were based at 34 Mount Pleasant, Bilston.

On 23 April 1903 services started over the South Staffordshire Tramways Company track) from Moxley to Darlaston.

The South Staffordshire and Birmingham District Steam Tramways Company which became the South Staffordshire Tramways Company operated a tramway service from their depot in Wednesbury between 1883 and 1924.

Control of the Dudley to Fighting Cocks section was transferred to the Company on 27 October 1903.

From 1 January 1904, the Birmingham and Midland Tramways Joint Committee took a controlling interest in the company.

On 9 November 1905, the section between Stow Heath Lane and Bilston was taken over by Wolverhampton Corporation Tramways, and the Deans Road to Willenhall section on 18 April 1906. Wolverhampton Corporation Tramways cars were modified with overhead equipment to operate through journeys. Wolverhampton Corporation Tramways used the Lorain Stud contact system on the remainder of their routes.

Wolverhampton Corporation Tramways operated a tramway service in Wolverhampton between 1902 and 1928.

The stud contact system is a once-obsolete ground-level power supply system for electric trams. Power supply studs were set in the road at intervals and connected to a buried electric cable by switches operated by magnets on the tramcars. Current was collected from the studs by a "skate" or "ski collector" under the tramcar. The system was popular for a while in the early 1900s but soon fell out of favour because of the unreliability of the magnetic switches.

Wolverhampton District Company cars were modified with Lorain Stud contact system equipment and on 15 October 1906 began working between Dudley and Wolverhampton. This was discontinued in 1909 and only restarted in 1921 when the Wolverhampton Corporation Tramways were all converted to overhead power.

The South Staffordshire Tramways Company closed on 1 April 1924, and the Company took over services between Darlaston and Wednesbury. Services between Wednesbury and Walsall, and Darlaston and Walsall, were operated jointly with Walsall Corporation Tramways.

Fleet

Services started with 13 double-deck open-top cars from the Electric Railway and Tramway Carriage Works

Closure

Walsall Corporation Tramways took over the section of the system between Willenhall and Darlaston on 1 October 1925, and, on 31 August 1928, the former South Staffordshire routes were transferred to the Dudley, Stourbridge and District Electric Traction Company. Wolverhampton Corporation purchased the rest of the Company assets and the company closed.

Related Research Articles

The West Midlands is a metropolitan county in western-central England with a 2014 estimated population of 2,808,356, making it the second most populous county in England after Greater London. It came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972, formed from parts of Staffordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire. The county itself is a NUTS 2 region within the wider NUTS 1 region of the same name. The county consists of seven metropolitan boroughs: the City of Birmingham, the City of Coventry and the City of Wolverhampton, as well as the boroughs of Dudley, Sandwell, Solihull and Walsall.

Bilston is a small market town and civil parish in the West Midlands. It is part of Wolverhampton and situated close to the borders of Sandwell and Walsall. The closest of these are Darlaston and Wednesbury as well as Willenhall and Tipton.

Willenhall is a market town situated in the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall, in the West Midlands, England, with a population taken at the 2011 census of 28,480. It is situated between Wolverhampton and Walsall, historically in the county of Staffordshire. It lies upon the River Tame, and is part of the Black Country.

Darlaston is a small market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall in the West Midlands of England. It located near Wednesbury and Willenhall.

The area straddles the historic border between the counties of Warwickshire, Staffordshire, Worcestershire.

Moxley is a part of Darlaston in the West Midlands. It was first developed during the early part of the 19th century when a handful of terraced houses were built to accommodate locals working in factories and mines and the area was created in 1845 out of land from Darlaston, Bilston and Wednesbury.

Walsall railway station is the principal railway station of Walsall, West Midlands, England and situated in the heart of the town. It is operated by West Midlands Trains, with services provided by West Midlands Railway. The main entrance is situated inside the Saddlers Shopping Centre.

Dudley Port railway station in Tipton, West Midlands, England, is on the Stour Valley Line. The station is operated by West Midlands Trains.

The South Staffordshire line is a partly used and partly disused railway line that once connected Burton-upon-Trent to Lichfield in Staffordshire and then to the West Midlands towns of Walsall, Dudley and Stourbridge. However, Dudley and Stourbridge were already joined to the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway's (OW&WR) line just north of Dudley Station. It in essence, continued to Stourbridge. The sections from Burton-Upon-Trent to Lichfield City remains open as well as the section from Ryecroft Junction to Bescot. The track from Walsall to Lichfield City is now both a footpath and disused while the section from Walsall to Dudley is mothballed.

The Walsall–Wolverhampton line is a railway line in the West Midlands, England. It connects the town of Walsall to the city of Wolverhampton. The complete line does not currently have any regular scheduled passenger services: The line's local passenger service was withdrawn in 1965, it was restored in 1998, only to be withdrawn again in 2008. At present, the main use of the line is by freight trains, and it is also used as a diversionary route when engineering works are carried out on the West Coast Main Line.

Wednesbury Town railway station was a station on the South Staffordshire Line.

Darlaston James Bridge railway station was a station built on the Grand Junction Railway in 1837, serving the James Bridge area in the east of the town centre of Darlaston, near the junction of Walsall Road and Bentley Mill Way.

Willenhall Bilston Street railway station was a station built on the Grand Junction Railway in 1837. It served the town of Willenhall, and was located just to the south of the town centre. It was one of two railway stations in the town - the other being Willenhall Stafford Street.

Walsall Corporation Tramways operated a tramway service in Walsall between 1904 and 1930.

The Kinver Light Railway operated a passenger and freight tramway service between Amblecote and Kinver, in South Staffordshire, between 1901 and 1930.

Wolverhampton Tramways Company operated a tramway service in Wolverhampton between 1878 and 1900.

References

↑ The Golden Age of Tramways. Published by Taylor and Francis.

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[1] The Golden Age of Tramways. Published by Taylor and Francis.