Chapter

5

Managing The Tram

Mr Traill hoped that the tramway would thrive on both goods and passengers. Mining did not increase like Mr Traill hoped it would because the North Coast of Ireland was not a brilliant place for mining any sort of minerals, so the mining industry declined.

The tramline turning into Bushmills Market only lasted for six years because the amount of farm produce for sale was so little that the Tram Company decided that it was not worth the money. The Trade Market in Portrush harbor was getting remarkably smaller. So this did not provide as much work for the tramway as they had hoped. Once lorries because more common, from about 1920 onwards, lots of goods traffic was carried by road so the Tram had not much goods to carry. Mr Traill had expected the tram to have lots of goods and not so many passengers, but as I mentioned in Chapter 4, there were so many passengers that some of the goods wagons were converted into passenger cars.