It would be hard to overestimate the historical significance among British tramcars of the London County Council’s 1931 prototype double-decker which became known as Bluebird No 1.
Among a number of smaller London municipalities, the LCC was the largest tramway operator in the capital. Their great rivals were the Underground Group, which owned three separate tramways and the mighty London General Omnibus Company.
One of the Underground company’s tram subsidiaries, the Metropolitan Electric Tramways, built its own “Bluebird” prototype, no: 318, one of the precursors of their large-capacity Feltham design, of which 331 survives at the National Tramway Museum.
The LCC Bluebird was powerful, capable of speeds up to 30mph and fitted with air brakes. Its interior offered standards of comfort that were rarely found in contemporary public transport vehicles. It was handsome, in a distinctive blue livery, and might have transformed London’s street transport. There are detailed descriptions at London County Council No. 1 – National Tramway Museum and LCC 1 – Restoration Par Excellence.
It remained unique because in 1933 all London’s tramways were absorbed into the London Passenger Transport Board, which quickly resolved to replace all its street tramways with trolleybuses and motor buses.
No: 1’s distinctive livery, part of an energetic publicity campaign to encourage passenger ridership, was replaced by the London Transport red and cream livery and during and after the war its non-standard specification meant it was little used.
When the LPTB sold the bulk of its fleet of Feltham trams to Leeds Corporation in 1951, Bluebird was included in the deal as a make-weight to replace two trams destroyed in a depot fire. In Leeds it was given the fleet number 301.
In 1957 Leeds City Council donated it to the British Transport Museum in London, which passed it on to the Tramway Museum at Crich, where it was repainted in London Transport livery.
I wrote a blog-article about Bluebird No 1 in 2015 [Bluebird no 1 | Mike Higginbottom Interesting Times] when it became apparent that its bodywork was deteriorating.
The subsequent protracted and expensive restoration is a fine achievement and an object-lesson in the principle that preservation of vehicles, like buildings and gardens, is a continuing process.
A sumptuous book, edited by Lynn Wagstaff, Bluebird Reborn: The History and Restoration of LCC No. 1 [Bluebird Reborn: The History & Restoration of LCC No. 1 (LRTA) – Platform 5] (LRTA 2023) gives a detailed account of the difficulties and dilemmas that beset returning a historic tramcar to its original condition.
Bluebird No 1 returned to service in September 2024 and gives visitors a chance to experience as new, a vehicle that’s nearly a century old.
That’s because, though as much as possible of the original has been incorporated in the restoration, it’s been stripped back to its component parts and built again.
Most of the trams in the operating fleet at Crich and other working transport museums have been substantially renewed, primarily to restore their appearance at a specific historic period, but also so they can safely carry passengers and provide enjoyment for decades to come. After all, the Flying Scotsman has had numerous modifications to its design, as well as eighteen different boilers, since it was built in 1923.
The alternative, as with Leeds 602 at Crich and Mallard in the National Railway Museum collection, is conservation rather than preservation, so museum pieces become relics rather than exhibits.
If we want to feel, see and hear what it’s like to ride in a 1932 modern tramcar, or a vintage car, bus or railway carriage, we can’t afford to be squeamish about provenance. Otherwise we’d be looking at a collection of garden sheds, chicken houses and cricket pavilions.