Starting Point - Preston Station. Finishing Point - Walton Summit. Distance 5 Miles.
The Preston Old Tram Road was a 4ft 3in gauge plateway, having L shaped rails on which flangeless wheels could run. It was built as a temporary substitute for a canal until funds could be raised to extend the Lancaster Canal to meet the Leeds & Liverpool Canal, a scheme that required extensive engineering works. The tram road opened in 1803 and ten years later the conversion of the route to a canal was still beyond the means of the company. In the end the coming of the railways meant the canal would never be built and the tram road (like many canal systems) was taken over by a railway company and wound up in the 1860s and 1870s. Much of the route from Preston to Bamber Bridge passed to the local authority for use as a footpath and remains as such today. More about the history of the tram road can be found on the Wikipedia article
On the above old map the coal wharfs can be seen just north of the main Fishergate street. The main purpose of the tram road was to bring coal from the Leeds & Liverpool Canal for transhipment north. On the north side of the coal wharf the rail connection to the coal yard from the railway through Preston's stations (the site of the current station and West Coast Main Line) can be seen. This connection allowed coal to reach Preston and the Lancaster Canal by rail and ultimately made the Old Tram Road obsolete. The site of the coal wharf is now an Aldi supermarket and retail park.
The tram road passed under Fishergate in a single track tunnel, this was widened after the tram road closed for use as a road access to the railway goods yards next to the station. Than tunnel survives as access for the Fishergate shopping centre car parks.
Below - The tunnel under Fishergate today.
I walked to Fishergate and Mount Street. On Mount Street I photographed the derelict hospital building below.
At the end of Mount Street is Garden Street and one of the walls of the tram road bridge over Garden Street survives.
Below - Abutment of the Garden Street bridge.
On the opposite side of the road Victorian houses have been built on the course of the track, a reminder of how long it is since the route closed.
The route can be picked up again in Avenham Park, it route along the northern edge of the park and the route survives as a path along the northern edge of the park.
Below - The Belvedere Pavilion was built on the site of the winding engine for a rope worked incline.
Below - Looking up the former rope worked incline.
At the foot of the incline the tram road crossed the River Ribble on a wooden trestle bridge. This survived long after the closure of the tram road for use as a footpath but the wooden trestles were replaced with concrete beams in 1938 and the deck replaced with concrete in the 1960s so although it has the look of the old trestle bridge there is little of the original bridge now. The bridge was closed in recent years due to structural concerns, in fact looking at the bridge it was clear at least a couple of the concrete beams were missing altogether. Plans for the replacement bridge leave nothing off the table and could see the Tram Road Bridge replaced with a modern suspension bridge. With the Tram Road Bridge closed I had to make my way around to the other end of the bridge on the disused railway bridge on the west of it.
Below - The closed concrete bridge that has its origins in the wooden trestle Tram Road Bridge.
Below - The stone abutment and cast iron connections for the wooden trestles, replaced with concrete in 1938. These are probably the only remnants of the original bridge.
There are a set of steps up the embankment from the path along the riverside, at the top of the steps one of the stones was revealed to have been a stone sleeper from the tram road.
Below - A look south along the Old Tram Road.
Below - Where the footpath (seen on the old map at the top of the page) connecting to Winery Road joins the path along the Old Tram Road some more stone sleepers can be seen.
The tram road curved to the east close to meeting the later railway route from Bamber Bridge to Preston.
Below - The curve in the Old Tram Road route, the later railway line can be seen on an embankment to the left, now also a footpath.
Below - An information board where the paths along the railway and tram road connect.
The footpath leads out on to a road also called Old Tram Road entering an area redeveloped with modern houses as Walton Park. After crossing Carrwood Road the route of the line continues as a footpath through the modern housing.
The path emerges on to Todd Lane North. The tram road continued through a field on the east side of the road but is not accessible and is also shortly after severed by the A6.
Below - The embankment of the Old Tram Road through the field east of Todd Lane North.
I took the footpath off Todd Lane North which crosses the A6 and emerges on to Danesway. The tram road ran along the back of what are now the backs of the houses on Danesway. A footpath is shown there emerging on to St Mary's Avenue but I found in very overgrown. The exit on to St Mary's Avenue had also at some point been fenced over but it was possible to exit to the road.
The trackbed has been built over in this area. I followed the roads to Meanygate, where this crossed under the surviving railway line the tram road used to cross under at the same bridge. The bridge has since been replaced with a smaller bridge, probably when the railway above was widened to access sidings here.
Most of the remainder of the route has been built on. At the corner of Smithy Street and Station Road a building has an irregular shape having been built up to the trackbed, I was unable to photograph this due to construction work on the pavement outside.
I took the footpath alongside the surviving railway line from Cambridge Road to Brierley Road. Brierley Road joins end on to a road called Tramway Lane, though this is just to the north of the course of the tram road. Tramway Lane continues under the M65, emerging on to Clayton Brooke Road. Across the route a footpath follows the course of the tram road for the final stretch to Walton Summit. The path is on an incline and was presumably rope worked like that at Avenham Park but this is not shown on the map.
Below - Looking down the course of the tram road from Walton Summit.
Below - The site of the connection between the tram road and the canal onward to the connection to the Leeds & Liverpool Canal at Whittle Springs. There used to be canal basins, wharves and a warehouse here but it is now just a small park within the modern housing.
The route of the old canal is cut across by the M61, which is unfortunate as Open Street Map shows a surviving bridge over the former canal in a field just east of the motorway, otherwise it is mostly built on apart from a small stretch at the junction. It would have been quite a trek to check out these remnants so I instead returned to Bamber Bridge station, though not for a train home but to return to Preston by some of the other old railways in the area.
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