Closure
Abandonment of the tramways began in 1938, but this was halted at the outbreak of World War II. Tram operations ceased in 1941 with the Luftwaffe's Good Friday raid, which set central Bristol on fire. A bomb hit Counterslip bridge, St Philips, next to the generating centre, and severed the tram power supply. The final tram from Old Market to Kingswood was given a push by passers-by and freewheeled its way into the depot.
Almost all Bristol's trams were scrapped; however, one is preserved by the Bristol Aero Collection which closed its museum at Kemble in May 2012 but expects to re-open in due course At Filton, Bristol. Another memorial to the system is a length of tram track still embedded in St Mary Redcliffe churchyard, where it was blown by a bomb. Two lengths of intact track can be seen at the car park of the Gloucester Road Medical Centre, and a short section of track still exists on the approach to Temple Meads railway station. Another section of track used to be still in place near Castle Park, but this was lost when the area was redeveloped as part of the Cabot Circus development.
The Bristol Tramways company continued as a bus operator, but the name was not changed to Bristol Omnibus Company until 1957.
Read more about this topic: Bristol Tramways