Ryde Pier Tramways

• 1.       Horse Drawn                                                                     1864

• 2.       A steam trial traction engine                                        1880

• 3.       Electric powered third rail traction Engine                1880

• 4.       Petrol engine                                                                     1927

• 5.       Diesel Engine                                                                    1959

The first foundation stone for the new Ryde Pier the designer being John Kent, was laid on the 29^th June 1813, the vision was to handle the increasing cross Solent passenger traffic and to make Ryde far more accessible to the growing number of Victorian passengers, who by this development will no longer need to take the dangerous disembarkation and embarkations steps of the past.  

One year later on the 29^th June 1814 the pier was opened, the original structure was 1740ft in length (527mts) with a 12ft wooden jetty to handle the docking requirements. As the passenger numbers increased and the size of the vessels wanting to berth grew the pier had to also extend to cope. In 1824 the pier was extended to 2020ft (618mts) and again in 1827 the pier head itself was enlarged.

A further pier extension to 2250ft took place in 1833ft (681mts) and the pier head had additions in 1842 and again in 1850.

The structure was by now a fairly long walk for anyone wanting to transport themselves to the pier head from esplanade and onto Portsmouth.  So in 1864 it was determined to add a pier tramway that would originally be drawn by horses as one can just make out by the following poor but still discernible image.

Horse Drawn Pier Tramway

One may well think in hindsight that the Ryde tramway became something of an industrial experimental  as the next means of power deployed to operate the trams was that of a short trial of a steam traction powered tramway, however this had little success. With the failure of the steam option the electric power was deployed in 1866 and so the new trams were powered by electric traction and a third rail feed. Thus Ryde had the distinction of being only the second Electric railway in England at the time with a line in Brighton taking first place.

1864 to 1867 saw great passenger growth in the use of the pier and its tramway addition and as the Islands Steam was now at the Esplanade it was in 1877 that the time came to extend the line to encompass the pier head by building a new pier. This then gave a through train from the boat to Sandown , Shanklin and Ventnor  the so called Victorian Riviera.  

In 1927 the electric tramway again gave way to the more efficient petrol engine railcars until 1959 when they were replace with two diesel powered Drewry railcars. These were still in operation until the closure of the tramway in 1969 when it was finally withdrawn and the tramway pier pensioned off.

The above image taken in 2010 as the Tramway again became useful when converted into a "walk way" while the main promenade pier to the right had major superstuctural repairs undertaken.