Created 3-Jan-23
Modified 11-Jun-24
At a Tramways Committee meeting on 16th September 1926 the General Manager was authorised to apply for permission to operate a route to Manor Road. Authority to operate had been given by the Ministry of Transport by the meeting on 23rd February 1927 but the service had already started operation on 1st January 1927. It started at the Town Hall and ran via Clegg Street, Union Street, Waterloo Street, Glodwick Road and Abbeyhills Road to Manor Road.
The original authority included operation along Manor Road and Roundthorn Road to Pitses but that does not seem to have taken place. Instead the service was extended to Pitses in July 1935, but directly along Abbeyhills Road.
In May 1953 the service was extended along Manchester Street, Manchester Road, Chapel Road and Limeside Road to Limeside (Laburnum Road). This was made particularly confusing as the extension was shared with the 7 from Higginshaw and therefore services were designated 7 from Abbeyhills to Limeside but G from Limeside to Abbeyhills. There were supplementary journeys from the Town Hall to Abbeyhills and these remained as the G in both directions.
The G and 7 were extended to Holts Estate from 29th April 1956, replacing the short-lived 20 service, but in their turn were cut back to Abbeyhills again when the V and 4 circular sevice was extended to serve Holts from 17th April 1959. From this time the services only ran in the peak hours and on Saturdays - in later years at least the service was suspended during Oldham Wakes and the Christmas period.
From 22nd September 1963 the G and the 7 were separated, with the G becoming a service from the Town Hall to Abbeyhills, with just a solitary journey running in the very early morning to Holts Estate. The G was diverted to run to Alt Estate from May 1965, although the early morning journey to Holts continued.
The G was renumbered 23 from 1st April 1968 and 423 from 2nd December 1973. At some point in the very early 1970s the service to Bar Gap Road ceased to be provided by the 7, with the 23 extended from the Town Hall. For some time it ran to the Whitehouse Inn on Oldham Edge, but returned to Bar Gap Road by 1974.
The service was withdrawn without replacement in 1980.
© David Beilby
