History of the Manly & Brookvale Tram and Bus Depots

Friends often ask why I like Trams because they  say it's quite a specific interest and an unusual   one for someone like me who grew up in Sydney  at a time for the first 30 years of my life no   trams ran in Sydney at all except perhaps down  at Loftus but as kids we all had an interest   in something I think and at my school we used  to play with various trading cards some were   on planes some were about trains some were ships  and while there were no tram cards I did like the   train ones I also did like the rugby league cards  but I guess the point is we all have interests   and it's hard to know why we have them to start  with my interest always been trains and trams   so it's a bit different for Backtracks today to  be making a video on not only trams but also on   buses so today it's a three for one deal if you  like because we'll look at the Manly Tram Depot   which then became the Manly Bus Depot which then  closed and moved to become the Brookvale Bus Depot   and the reason we're doing it this week was that  Backtrack was able to attend the Brookvale Bus   Depot open day last weekend which was pretty  good fun it was great to go inside a working   depot which is usually restricted to the public  but also then to see about eight buses through   the ages right from the time of trams through to  the future of the bus network and we got a tour   of the workshop which will show in the second half  of this video I'm Marty and welcome to backtracks for the entire length of time the Manly Tram  System was in operation it was serviced by the   Manly Tram Depot that Depot opened in 1903 as  a steam tram shed and it just had two tracks   and it was rebuilt in 1911 for electric trams  then with six tracks it served the isolated   manly lines with the lines such as those to The  Spit to Harbord and all the way up to Narrabeen   at its peak in 1924 the depot had a total  staff of nearly 80 people with 26 drivers   and the rest being conductors and office staff  and its maximum peak hour capacity had 18 cars   out in operation out of the 23 that were stored  there now originally the trams were H and J-Class   and when the Brookvale line was electrified  it was also then served by O-Class cars and   by 1914 all the lines were using O-Class the Manly  Depot closed as a tram depot along with the whole   Manly Network in September 1939 and then buses  replaced the trams at the depot the tram shed is   still standing today and has remained true to  its 1914 form right to this day with the only   main change being that the water tower from  the steam tram era has since been removed the   shed continued to be used by buses until it was  adopted for commercial use as a car dealership   and now today as a Harris Farm supermarket that's  actually a pretty good supermarket I it's pretty   pricey but you can get a good range of products  you don't get to see in other major chains   now the buses remain there until 1952 when the new  Brookdale Bus Depot was open and that bus depot   remains in operation there till today Brookvale  Bus Depot is a bus depot in the Sydney suburb of   Brookdale that operates bus and on-demand services  for the northern beaches and the lower North   Shore of Sydney it has an allocation of around  240 buses in October 2021 it was transferred   from the State Transit Authority to KeliosDowner  Northern beaches as part of the Region 8 contract   KeliosDowner operates a number of transit  systems including the G:Link Light Rail on   the Gold Coast the Newcastle Light Rail and  Yara Trams in Melbourne as I mentioned at the   opening I haven't really had a big interest in  buses mainly because I used to catch them every   day to school and that was somewhere I didn't  really want to go but now over the years the   buses I used to catch have become museum pieces  so it was really interesting to see some of these   childhood memories and some that I didn't  have a catch on display here at the open day   so all the buses here at the open day had some  connection to the Northern Beaches so let's go   from oldest to newest and the first was the Albion  Venturer double deck bus after World War II a   total of 845 double-decker buses were ordered from  AEC Albion and Leyland in the United Kingdom these   buses were designed to slowly replace the trams as  the lines closed up till 1961. Albion of Glasgow   Scotland supplied 143 of these Albion Venturer  chassis and now the Albions became synonymous   with the Warringah area being the mainstay of  Sydney's longest bus route the famous 190 which   ran all the way from Wynyard to Palm Beach and it  operated that bus run from 1948 to the late 1970s   now in that same era the Leyland Titan double  decker bus arrived on the scene in Sydney there   were 203 of this type and they were supplied by  Leyland Motors of England now this bus here 2033   entered service in 1948. now interestingly it  entered in the Burwood area and it was one of   the replacement vehicles for the Ashfield and  Burwood to Mortlake and Cabarita Tramway now in   1950 this bus was transferred to Newcastle where  it worked for another 18 years and then in 1968   it returned to Sydney and went to Randwick Depot  then to Hingsgrove Depot and it stopped working   as a regular bus in September 1972 and it was  later preserved by the State Transit Authority as   the closure of the Sydney tram Network increased  pace in the 1950s the New South Wales Government   ordered three batches of underfloor type buses  the first 100 which were called Leyland Royal   Tigers and AEC Regal IVs were delivered in 1953  and 1954 and this was followed by a further order   of 250 buses now this bus here the Leyland Royal  Tiger Worldmaster they had cool names didn't they   was one of the 125 buses of this type that was  supplied by Leyland Motors of England in the late   1950s the next bus we'll talk about is the Leyland  Atlantean another cool name a double decker   bus that was one of the 244 that were made and  supplied by British Leyland of England from 1970   right up until 1986. the first Atlanteans were  delivered to the Brookvale and Mona Vale Depots   now these were designed for one-man driver-only  operation and so these Atlanteans were subject of   a bitter dispute between the unions and the public  transport commission at the time regarding the   phasing out of conductors this bus here 1003  entered service in 1970 and was withdrawn in   March 1981 after an accident in the late 1960s  232 Leyland Leopards another great name entered   service these became known as the Mark 1 or Green  Leopards this order was followed by a further   order of 200. These became known as the Mark II  or Blue Leopards and then a final order of 312   Blue Leopards followed now this bus here we're  looking at 1763 was the last bus of this order   so in total 745 Leyland Leopards were  delivered now bus operations on the   Northern Beaches Warringah area have always needed  high capacity buses to cope with peak hour loads   now the Mercedes-Benz articulated bus or Bendy Dus  were 30 buses of this type that were supplied by   Mercedes-Benz of Germany from 1981 to 1984. now  these so-called bendy buses were pretty big and   they could carry up to 109 passengers bendy buses  still run on the Northern beaches to this day   now we're really in the present day now the second  last bus we'll look at is the B-Line it's a 27   kilometer bus route that runs between Wynyard  in the center of the city of Sydney to Mona   Vale on the Northern Beaches it began operation in  November 2017 and operates 24 hours a day with 38   double deck buses now while we're looking at the  beeline here at Brookvale Depot the B-Line buses   actually are worked out of the Mona Vale Depot  also operated by Kelly OS Downer now looking   into the future KeliosDowner will introduce 125  electric buses over the next eight years with   Brookvale being one of the two depots that will  operate the new Custom Denning Element 2. now the   Custom Buses website had a lot of info and videos  on the Element 1 but I couldn't find any specific   details when the first buses will start operating  out of Brookvale but they look pretty cool   one of the highlights of the open day at  Brookvale was being able to go on a tour   of the workshops something that most punters  wouldn't normally get to do now the workshop at   Brookvale apparently is one of the largest  in Sydney and it operates 24 hours a day   it can do a heap of different things in terms  of maintaining the network it holds up to 7   000 parts and manages the 240 buses that are  stored at the Depot apparently the place can   do body fabrication they can do electrical work a  whole range of engineering including gears brakes   and engines and there's also a bay for spray  painting buses 30 people work in the workshop   and it's a pretty busy place because some of the  buses at the Depot have run nearly 1.4 million   kilometers before they exited the fleet so it  takes a lot of time to keep them on the road   and apparently overnight is one of the busiest  times of the workshop because they're busy   replacing the most common issue which has knocked  off mirrors replacing and retreading tires   cleaning and refueling the buses during the tour  we found out that they changed nearly 30 tires a   week and we asked why a lot of mirrors get knocked  off well the simple answer is that the buses were   designed for roads that are actually wider than  they drive on particularly around The Spit Bridge   and finally they showed us the bus washing area  and also the place where they will convert to   manage and recharge the electric buses so there  you have it the story of a steam tram depot that   became an electric tram depot that then became a  bus depot that then moved a couple of kilometers   up the road to become one of Sydney's largest  bus depots [Tram Bell] well that about wraps   up another Backtracks thanks for watching and if  you haven't please Like And Subscribe and thanks   always to our information sources that make these  videos possible and hopefully we'll see you next   time when we take another look at the history  of trams and maybe some buses on Backtracks

Channel: BackTracks.Channel

Views: 807

Keywords: Tram, Trolley, Streetcar, train, Sydney, Australia

Id: fhQAIbIv2aY

Length: 11min 4sec (664 seconds)

Published: Sat May 27 2023