Huddersfield Corporation Coal Tram

Street car tramways often carried freight as well as the usual passenger traffic, usually parcels and mail but in the case of the Huddersfield Corporation Tramway it also included coal. The tramway had already been used to transport coal since horse tram days, and was to the unusual track gauge of 1,416mm to allow traffic from local coal tramways to travel over the street tram network. Although the intention was to use steam locomotives to haul coal trains, two special coal trams were also built to carry coal from sidings at the tram terminus at Outlane district to three mills nearby [1] as well as coal for the tramway's own power station.

Information
Number built:	2
Built:	1904
Builder:	Milnes, Voss & Company
Motor:	2 Westinghouse electric motors (DC OHLE)
Power:	90 hp (67 kW)

The Coal Trams could carry up to ten tons of coal [2]. They had a simple design, a standard open wagon on top of a tram truck. The low height of the coal chutes used (just over two metres above rail level) necessitated a lower body than was usual with freight trams. The coal was discharged through side doors.

The Huddersfield tram network went into decline in the 1930s and closed in 1940, the Coal Trams were scrapped along with the rest of the fleet.

Two views of Number 72 in use [2]

The Coal Tram had a simple design

[1] R.W. Rush, British Electric Tramcar Design 1885-1950 (Oxford Publishing, 1976) p. 121
[2] "Coal car at Huddersfield", Street Railway Journal Vol. XXIV No. 19 (Nov 1904) p. 834