The Hannover Tram Museum, Wehmingen I.
The main aim of our current "Tour de Trams light" trip was a visit to the Hannoversches Strassenbahn Museum (the Hannover Tram museum), located in Wehmingen.
We had the luck to arrive there in a suitable style: our friend and tram-fan from Hannover, Wolfgang was able to get us onboard the heritage shuttle tram that provided a nice way of getting nearer to the museum. It started at Döhren, but we already boarded it at the heritage depot Buchholz.
The steel-bodied tramcar was built by HaWa in 1928.
We passed through the tunnels of the Hannover Stadtbahn (city light rail) system, and headed for Sarsted, sometimes as fast as 50-60 km/h. Not at all bad from an oldtimer!
From Sarsted we were carried by another special service, namely this old articulated bus.
Hannoversches Strassenbahn-Museum, Sehnde-Wehmingen
Wehmingen is a small village located south-east of Hannover, far away from the "real" Hannover light rail system.
The current museum society HSM was founded after the Deutsches Strassenbahn Museum (German Tram Museum) went bankrupt. This was a huge undertake, because the DSM had 334 (!) old trams in its collection, plus a number of other vehicles. Some of these were in a very bad condition, so a reorganisation was necessary. Nowadays they're working hard to provide shelter for the surviving tramcars of german systems (of which many was closed in the last decades), and to get as much of them working as possible. Currently they have 62 motor cars, 35 trailers, 25 works cars, 29 works trailers, 5 trolleybuses, 1 motor bus and two omnibus trailers.
Unfortunately the weather was again quite bad: pale lights and pouring rain. They say it was much better the next day - probably because I wasn't there :-) On the picture a gazebo in the court of the museum, which BTW used to be a mine yard originally.
The oldest piece in the collection came from by hometown: it's an old unit of the Milleneum Subway Line of Budapest. It was built in 1895/96, and due to the nature of this line, it can be seen as (one of) the world's first low-floor tramcar :) It's a bit incomplete, but still very nice.
Berlin type T24 from 1925 in the exhibition hall. As you can see, most of the things here are not exactly in a posh condition, but at least they're safe now. Of course in my (odd - I know) opinion a streetcar MUST be a bit worn - looking fresh and shiny like as if coming out of the factory is not really typical for something that has been used for many decades!
This unit is the same type as the one we came here with.
"Driving school" car of the Kiel system, which was closed in the 1980's. The vehicle was built in 1900 by Herbrand, and then rebuilt to this role in 1960.
Neutchatel (Switzerland) is also featured in the collection.
Number 160 of Basel (also Switzerland) was built by Schlieren in 1920.
Y-shaped steel sleepers and different types of rails - the museum sports a large collection of miscellaneous items having something to do with tramways or urban public transit.
Heidelberg number 81, a "Verbandstyp II" car built by Fuchs in 1955.
A "half-train" of the OEG (Oberrheinische Eisenbahn-Gesellschaft), built by Fuchs in 1928.
Two years ago we saw one of the "kins" of this unit in Mannheim.
A Hamburg tramcar from 1951 - of course with trolley pole current collector.
This strange thing is a sprinkler car from Duisburg.
Another works car: a Schörling rail grinder built in 1955, (last) used in Essen.
3-axle Westwaggon double-set, originally built for the Bonn-Bad Godesberg-Mehlem tramway.
I like this type very much, hopefully these cars can be renovated soon.