Tramways to Highways: The Barbados Tramway Company

Despite Barbados being one of the smaller islands in the region sitting at 166 square miles (pure laugh pure smiles), traveling across the country has always been difficult, densely forested areas and deep gullies were, and in some aspects still are barriers to travel in the region. However, despite being one of the smaller islands in the region, by its peak Bridgetown held the largest, longest running horse drawn tram network in the region.

Now there were two forms of trams, electric trams which draw power from the rails in order to move forward along the track and horse drawn trams or horsecars wherein the horses pulled the carts along a fixed rail to the end of the route. Both of these types of trams existed in the Caribbean, with the territories of Cuba, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Puerto Rico owning electric trams and territories like Barbados and Curacao dealing with horsecars (Morrison 2009).

Electric Tram, Puerto Rico

San Juan Light and Transit Co. Tram No. 8. Postcard. Tramz. n.d. http://www.tramz.com/pr/sj.html

Though Barbados would eventually host a spectacular tramway system, there had been a long road to that goal. The system of colonialism, and by proxy mercantilism denies colonies any advancement outside of the profit making capabilities it can provide its coloniser. Many islands in the Caribbean, Barbados included were (and still can be) characterized by overdevelopment in an industry sector and underdevelopment in areas such as infrastructure, manufacturing or production. Indeed as Richard Hart explains in the book ‘Labour Rebellions of the 1930s in the British Caribbean Region Colonies’ the 1930s riots throughout the Caribbean were a symptom of these failures on the behalf of the colonial governments and Britain, who consistently neglected the living conditions of the majority population (housing, medical infrastructure, road maintenance, and unemployment) largely due to the fact that after the abolition of slavery in 1838, the region no longer provided England with money and as such it turned its eyes to the east.

Sailors on a Tram. Postcard. Tramz. nd. http://www.tramz.com/bb/00.html

As such, when the residents petitioned the government to create a tramway system in 1851, it deemed the cost of £5,000 per mile too large a price and as it was for public transportation, rather than use in the sugar industry, no tracks were lain until three decades later (Morrison 2009). The project might have never been undertaken had it not been for Scottish born engineer Robert Fairlee, who obtained the rights to build a street railway in Bridgetown and registered Barbados Tramway Company on 5 December 1882. While its first tramline took three years to construct, going two miles to Hastings Rock, it was the start of something big. The trams congregated near Nelson’s statue in Heroes Square (formerly Trafalgar Square) akin to a tram station, because unlike most other forms of transport during this time, the tramlines did not pass through the one railway in the island (Morrison 2009).

A tram named "JUBILEE" turning from Pine Road onto Belmont Road on the Belleville line

Pine Road, Belle Ville Barbados. Postcard. Tramz. nd. http://www.tramz.com/bb/00.html

As the 1800s passed, the Barbados Tramway Company, expanded creating 5 tracks which 25 horsecars traversed. It extended from its centre in Heroes Square in all cardinal directions, to Pine Road in the east, Belfield in the north, with a track to Hindsbury sitting in between them, to Fontabelle through broad street on the west and all the way down, the longest and first track to St Lawrence in the south (Morrison 2009). Contrary to most countries, Barbadian tramcars were not registered by number, rather by name.

However, the advent of gasoline buses in 1906 began to spill the first drops of doom for the company. Though the Barbados Transport Board would not be created until 1955 (Barbados Government Website), bus companies began to spring up, traveling many of the same routes of the tramways with markedly more speed and comfort. By 1910, unable to handle the competition, the company was sold to U.S. investors and renamed The Bridgetown Tramway Company with plans to extend to Speightstown and Oistins, but with what capital? Bus companies like Rocklyn and Elite with their open air wooden bodies dominated the transport scene so much so that at one time there were 14 bus companies on the island, each focusing on a particular area of the island (Bajan Bus). That, in addition to  the comparative ease it took to build a bus via the practice of importing the chassis and hiring woodworkers to build a frame over the tediously slow and expensive system of track building pushed the Bridgetown Tramway Company out of business by 1925 (Bajan Bus).

The Barbados Tramway Company by its end had a track system spanning 16km (10 mi), covered by the same 25 carts it had started with 40 years ago. Though it had never been electrified as seen in Puerto Rico, Trinidad, Cuba and Jamaica, the steady reliability of the horse drawn tramcart had for a period, eased the travel woes that made life difficult in the island at this time.

Map of The Barbados Tramway Company Tramlines

Morrison, Allen. Bridgetown Tramway Map. Map. Tramz. nd. http://www.tramz.com/bb/00.html

Bibliography

GOV.BB. Barbados Government. Accessed September 25, 2022. https://www.gov.bb/State-Bodies/transport-board#:~:text=In%20June%20of%201955%2C%20the,Parliament%20on%20August%2024%2C%201955.

Hart, Richard. Labour Rebellions of the 1930s in the British Caribbean Region Colonies: Richard Hart. London: Caribbean Labour Solidarity & Socialist History Society, 2002.

Morrison, Alan. “The Tramways of Bridgetown Barbados.” The Tramways of Barbados, 2009. http://tramz.com/bb/00.html.

“Our History.” #1 Bajan Bus, March 18, 2022. https://bajanbus.com/our-history/.