The Lancastrian Transport Trust has taken a review of its depot portfolio and from the end of March will be vacating Brinwell Road Depot. This follows discussions with Classic Bus North West and the BusWorks who also use the space. With the potential of Thornton Gate to house many of the trust’s collection of road and rail vehicles as well as Weeton for long term storage it was felt that Brinwell Road could not be sustained in the long term.
The more frequently used vehicles will be housed at BusWorks with the Classic Bus North West fleet. The less regularly use and buses in long term store will be moved to Weeton with the rest of the collection. Most of the trams will remain at Rigby Road, where a storage agreement has being agreed, but this has increased the Trust’s monthly outgoings. This leaves a small number of trams and buses to be stored on a private site. Not forgetting Blackpool 703 and Blackpool 605 at Beamish.
These are very important times for the trust, and certainly very challenging times. Although ideally this situation would not be happening as it takes away the efforts on restoration being put into the massive task of removing the vehicles etc, it was felt that with the current high cost of storage that this is the most cost effective measure.
100 years ago the White Star Line were making finishes touches to the Titanic that captured the world headlines for all the wrong reasons on its maiden voyage. On 26 March in 2012, our Open Boat car has undergone its own voyage at Beamish following the great efforts of the Beamish volunteer tram group. Rubbed down ready for repainting, 605/233 basked in the afternoon Spring sunshine on its trial run following the refitting of its trolley tower.
After a pause in the tram's restoration, work has resumed on Railcoach 279 this week. The trolley tower and steel bumpers have been sent away for shotblasting and should return later this week. All timberwork to complete the interior trim and the pre-panelling work around the cabs is on hand and arrangements are being made to get this fitted.
One of the results of the exit plan from Brinwell Road depot is that several vehicles that haven't seen the light of day for many years have emerged, giving the opportunity to take photographs. Lytham 61, a Northern Counties bodied PD2 is one vehicle that has been tucked away since 2003 but on 20th March it was extracted and towed to our Weeton premises.
Work on Open Boat 233/605 is progressing well at Beamish with rubbing down of the paintwork in hand ready for a repaint prior to Easter in original style livery. The trolley tower has returned after shotblasting whilst the controllers & circuit breakers are being serviced in preparation for the busy summer ahead of it. 
Open Boat 605 departed for Beamish on Wednesday 29th February, after our leap year proposal was accepted by the museum for a two year loan of the tram. Travelling via the M55 and M6 motorways north to Penrith, 605 stayed at Scotch Corner overnight after crossing the Pennines on the A66. It arrived at Beamish on 1st March at 08:15 and touched down one hour later. As usual Scotts Heavy Haulage did an excellent job and the tram was safely unloaded before the start of the day's tram service.