Original Midland Metro tram get new lease of life

One of the 24.4m articulated AnsaldoBreda T69 trams delivered to start service when the first part of Midland Metro opened in May 1999 between Wolverhampton and Birmingham Snow Hill is now being refurbished with government Clean Futures funding to become a test bed for sustainable developments in the industry. 

 

Car 16, the last in the initial fleet, was sold to UK Tram after withdrawal in 2015 and stored at Long Marston, but has now been donated to the Black Country Innovative Manufacturing Organisation (BCIMO), and will be displayed to invited guests at the Dudley Very Light Rail development and test site on 30 April. 

 

The tram has been restored and repainted and will be converted for battery operation over the summer. 

 

James Hammett, Managing Director of UK Tram said they were delighted to see it transformed, ‘This collaboration ticks more boxes than we could have envisaged for the Clean Futures programme, the BCIMO’s goals and our vision for the wider light rail sector’.