Trips down memory lane _{by Madelaine Empson}

Henry Brittain has been awarded a King’s Service Medal for services to transport history and tourism. Born and bred in Wellington and now based in Waikanae, Brittain has been involved with Wellington Tramway Museum – set up to preserve Wellington’s tramway heritage in 1964 – since 1965, supporting it to become an operational tramway that restores the trams of yesteryear for passengers to ride. Brittain has held several key committee roles at Wellington Tramway Museum, including president from 1997 to 2009, when he was made a life member. Considered an expert on tram history, he has been president of the Council of Tramway Museums of Australasia since 2021 and has myriad fascinating stories about how life in Wellington used to be: when nary a car was in sight and everyone rode the tram to work.

From what I understand, public transport in Wellington was dominated by the tram between 1878 and 1964?

That’s right. There were different eras. The first one was steam trams, which were very popular, very heavy. They gave way to horse trams. The horse trams ran till about 1904, when the council introduced electric trams. They ran between Newtown and the Railway Station and then started pushing out to the suburbs. They actually opened up the whole of Wellington.

Wow. Why did all that change?

I think it was a worldwide trend to move away from trams. They were cumbersome. They were inflexible. They decided round about 1944 that they would start investigating and putting in trolleybuses. They bought 10 trolleybuses about 1947 and put them into service in 1948. The first line they did was Oriental Bay, and then they moved onto Wadestown, and then progressively, they replicated all the tram routes with trolleybuses until 1964, when they closed the tram system down. The trams were getting old, people wanted something a bit more modern, something that didn’t have wooden seats in it. It was just really a case of progress, I suppose.

When you go to places like Melbourne today and see how efficient their public transport system is and what a difference the trams make… it’s like a full circle moment.

It is. One of Wellington’s handicaps is its narrow streets. If you look at the Melbourne trams, they’ve got the room to accommodate them. And, of course, they never got rid of them in the first place. If you wanted to put trams back in Wellington, it would cost you billions of dollars, really. You’ve got to dig up the streets, get right down low to accommodate the rails. What’s happened since 1964 is that all the pipes and all the sewerage pipes aren’t deep enough to actually put a tram on top of them.

Is there part of you that that wishes we had kept the trams?

If you take Christchurch as an analogy, they have introduced a tourist tramway around the city. That works very well and is very popular. If Wellington had kept something, right? Just running from, say, Courtenay Place to the Railway Station. Well, that would solve a lot of the issues that we talk about now. But it would have to be a sort of tourist tramway, rather than a community tramway.

Wellington Tramway Museum runs a tram service for passengers?

Yes, every half hour on a Saturday and a Sunday and a public holiday. The first tram starts from 11 o’clock, and the last tram to the beach is at four o’clock. Often people will get on the tram, go for a walk or picnic on the beach, and come back on a later one. They’re all-day tickets, so you can ride the tram as much as you like. Included in our price is a look around our Tram Museum, the tram barn, where we have memorabilia, cable car seats, a small theatrette. There’s a mock-up tram motorman’s platform for kids to go on, play with the controls, ring the bell. They can see what it’s like and pretend to drive a tram.

Which restored Wellington trams have you got running on your system?

We have the 1904 tram, which we have just restored, back in the system. That’s half open and half closed, half a saloon. The other ones we have are called double saloons, and they are three compartments. Then we have the later ones called Fiducias, which are one saloon. The very first one of that style was introduced in 1932 and it was called Fiducia, a Latin word that means trust and integrity. Basically, New Zealand was starting to come out of the depression, and it was designed to give a bit of encouragement.

With Fiducias livening people’s spirits back in the day, what kind of reactions do you get from people visiting Wellington Tramway Museum today? I’m thinking of kids riding the trams and the joy that must bring.

Kids like riding on them, yes, but it’s more the parents, I think! And the older people. You get a lot of reminiscing, people saying, ‘I remember as a young child going with my grandmother to the zoo’, things like that. For many people, it’s a bit of a trip down memory lane. It’s a part of history, part of nostalgia.

Growing up in Wellington, what do you think first sparked your interest in trams?

My grandfather was an inspector on the trams, that’s probably where my interest started. I lived in Karori most of my early days and we used to catch the tram into town. Then when I went to Wellington College, I caught the tram from Karori for the very first year, because they stopped in 1954 which was my first year at college, and then I used to catch the trolleybus from 1955 onwards down to the Cenotaph. You could go across to the Railway Station to catch the tram, the school special, from there. So, I made a special point of riding on the trams every opportunity I got. My father had a chemist shop on Manners Street. When I was at college, I’d often go down to the shop, and the trams ran right past there, so I’d sit behind the window and write tram numbers down. You did in those days! Trying to tick off all the numbers. I had a complete list of all the trams on the road.

You were there on the last day of the tram in Wellington and have been involved with Wellington Tramway Museum nearly since day dot. Can you talk me through the ride?

I’ve contributed and done my bit and driven trams and done restoration and been president for 12 years. It’s just a part of my life. It’s good to be able to preserve Wellington’s history. As a side issue, I’m also involved in the Omnibus Society, which preserves old buses, and we have some old Wellington diesel and trolleybuses. I’ve always been involved in vintage transport, and I was secretary of the Karori Historical Society for probably about 15 years, too. The historical side of Wellington has always been part and parcel of it.

How did it feel to receive the King’s Service Medal? When we first spoke, you said you felt it belonged to everyone at Wellington Tramway Museum.

Yes and it’s the first one in New Zealand, where New Zealand has recognised the tramway preservation societies, really. I see it as being broader than just Wellington Tramway Museum.

Is there anything you’d like to leave our readers with?

We’re open weekends, come and visit us! Come and see what helped open up Wellington. The tramway system is how people got around. In the 1920s, everyone caught the trams. All the big sports fields were out in the suburbs. That’s how you got to Karori to play hockey. And on Sundays, they used to run special trams up to Karori Cemetery. It was just part of Wellington.