Douglas Southern Electric Tramway

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Douglas Head Marine Drive Electric Tramway
Harbour Ferry Incline Railway Douglas Head Tollgate Pigeon Stream Depot Farm Loop Wallberry Loop Wallberry Viaduct Horseleap Viaduct Little Ness Loop No 1 Little Ness Loop No 2 Little Ness Depot Whing Loop Coolebegad Loop Keristal Loop No 1 Keristal Loop No 2 Port Soderick Cliff Lift

Douglas Southern Electric Tramway was a standard gauge tramway which ran from the top of Douglas Head on the Isle of Man to the nearby resort of Port Soderick atop the cliffs via a number of spectacular viaducts and bridges.^[1]

[edit] Overview

It was opened in 1896 and operated until 1939, never re-opening after the war and was largely lifted and destroyed by 1955 with one of the power cars being retrieved for preservation at the National Tramway Museum at Crich in Derbyshire where it resides to this day. There is little left of the line as it was, same for the grand castellated entrance to the Marine Drive itself. The tramway's sheds and workshops were located mid-way along the line at Little Ness, together with the power station for generating the electricity but this was filled in and now provides a car park. Owing to a number of serious landslides the roadway has been closed for several years, but in the 1960s the local authority of Douglas Corporation attempted to rejuvenate the area by introducing a bus service on the coastal route which was short-lived, owing to further landslides which made the road unsafe. Today the route is only accessible on foot but provides a spectacular view of the Irish Sea and the former route of this unique lost railway.

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