The A type Adelaide tram was a class of 70 drop-end, Californian combination trams built by

Duncan & Fraser Duncan & Fraser Limited was a vehicle manufacturing company founded in 1865 in Adelaide, South Australia that built horse-drawn carriages and horse trams, and subsequently bodies for trains, electric trams and motor cars, becoming one of the larg ...

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

in 1908/09 for the

Municipal Tramways Trust The Municipal Tramways Trust (MTT) was established by the Government of South Australia in December 1906 to purchase all of the horse-drawn tramways in Adelaide, Australia. The Trust subsequently also ran petrol and diesel buses and electric tr ...

(MTT). They were used on tram lines to Kensington,

Marryatville Marryatville is a small suburb about east of Adelaide's central business district, in the local council area of City of Norwood Payneham St Peters. Comprising low- to medium-density housing, two large schools, a church and several shops, it ...

, Maylands, Payneham, Wakerville,

North Adelaide North Adelaide is a predominantly residential precinct and suburb of the City of Adelaide in South Australia, situated north of the River Torrens and within the Adelaide Park Lands. History Surveyor-General Colonel William Light of the colo ...

, Parkside,

Unley Unley is an inner-southern suburb of Adelaide, South Australia, within the City of Unley. The suburb is the home of the Sturt Football Club in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL). Unley neighbours Adelaide Park Lands, Fullar ...

and Hyde Park. In later years they were cascaded to quieter services to

Croydon Croydon is a large town in south London, England, south of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Croydon, a local government district of Greater London. It is one of the largest commercial districts in Greater London, with an extensi ...

and the isolated Port Adelaide network."Adelaide's Toastrack Trams" '' Trolley Wire'' issue 258 August 1994 pages 3, 8.A type tram 1 (1908)
Tramway Museum, St Kilda Their California combination description encompassed their combination of a central saloon compartment and open cross-bench seating at each end; a design that had proved popular in

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

, with its climate similar to Adelaide's. When the MTT introduced an alphabetical classification system in 1923, they were designated A type. Many were retired in the 1930s, but most returned to service during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

operating in coupled pairs to conserve manpower. These were nicknamed ''Bib & Bubs'' after comic characters created by children's author

May Gibbs Cecilia May Gibbs MBE (17 January 1877 – 27 November 1969) was an Australian children's author, illustrator, and cartoonist. She is best known for her gumnut babies (also known as "bush babies" or "bush fairies"), and the book '' Snugglepot ...

. The remaining examples were withdrawn in 1952. They were never fitted with air brakes, instead using handbrakes for normal stops and magnetic track brakes for emergencies. All 70 were originally fitted with Brill Winner style (tip-over) seats in the saloon section; in 1937 20 cars swapped their seats with Hale & Kilburn fixed rattan seats from 20 C type trams. Numbers 10, 69 and 92 were sold to the State Electricity Commission of Victoria and placed in service in Ballarat as numbers 21, 23, and 22. The former remained in service until the system closed in 1971.Ballarat tram 21 (1909)
Tramway Museum, St Kilda

Preservation

Two have been preserved: *1 and 10 by the

Tramway Museum, St Kilda The Tramway Museum, St Kilda is Australia's principal museum of the 19th and 20th century trams of Adelaide, South Australia. It is situated at St Kilda, north of the centre of Adelaide. It is operated by the Australian Electric Transport Mus ...

References

Adelaide tram vehicles {{SouthAustralia-rail-transport-stub