CAPITAL FOCUS
The London Trams network, based on Croydon, celebrates its 25th birthday next year. As it reaches that milestone, Transport for London is turning its attention to replacing the original tram fleet.
Twenty-four CR4000 trams were supplied by Bombardier for the opening of the network in 2000 (now there are 23, because one was written off following the Sandilands derailment in 2016). To increase capacity on the Wimbledon line, the fleet was augmented in the 2010s with the delivery of 12 Stadler Variobahn trams, which were supplied in batches between 2012 and 2016.
‘The Bombardier vehicles are ageing and becoming less reliable, and parts are becoming obsolete’ says Navid Golshan, TfL’s General Manager for London Trams. These maintenance challenges have prompted TfL to slightly reduce service frequencies. Previously 30 trams were scheduled to be used from the overall fleet of 35 – this has been provisionally reduced to 28 trams in service (on Sundays the requirement drops to 23 trams). ‘Our focus is on offering a stable, reliable headway between trams’ says Mr Golshan. There was separate disruption recently due to an issue affecting wheels on the trams – this was caused by debris in track g…
