Finally, in October 1935, the council decided to abandon the tramway for good. An order-in-council was needed to overturn the original authority to operate the tramway, and that statutory permission was granted in March 1936 by the Government.
Retiring town clerk John Dick pointed out in July 1936 (past Napier mayor Alan Dick's grandfather), the tramways were efficient in 1916, but competition from "motor vehicles and pushbikes caused the service to languish".
The overhead tramway copper wires were dismantled in June 1936 and sold to a Wellington scrap dealer for £209 ($25,000). (The Hastings St ones, as shown in the photo, had already been removed when the business area was being rebuilt.)
Some confidence was expressed by the council that the sleepers, rails and other equipment could also be sold to recoup the costs of removing them from the streets. A degree of urgency existed as it was thought the rotting sleepers upon which the rails were resting underground might cause the road surfaces to sink.
Trouble occurred when the approximately 70 men employed to remove the tramway gear and the children's playground on the Marine Parade to make room for the Tom Parker fountain and the planting of trees on Kennedy Rd, went on strike.
The men were employed part-time on the No 5 government work scheme and were protesting against the Napier Borough Council using the scheme. Their demands, after holding meetings, were they be given a full 40 hour week and to be paid the normal award rates of pay by the council, and not the No 5 scheme's lower sustenance payments.
The men went back to work after a visit from the Minister of Labour, the Hon H T Armstrong, who told them to stop their strike, and that he would consider their requests.
During the strike, the sustenance payments were suspended, but the men requested they still be paid.
Payment would be made to the men – but they had to make up the time they lost while on strike.
The Minister of Labour's department then began negotiations with the Napier Borough Council to convert the job of removing the tram tracks to fulltime work for the men.
However, the Minister of Labour stated: "If unsuccessful in negotiations for fulltime on these jobs, relief labour will have to be withdrawn from them and serious consideration given to the question of tapering off other No 5 scheme jobs in Napier."
This was enough to make the Napier Borough Council provide a 40 hour week for the men and a weekly payment of £4 6 shillings and 8 pence, with the government paying a subsidy of £2 5 shillings.
Mayor C O Morse when announcing this said most of the reclaimed material would be sold to recoup these unbudgeted costs.
Inquiries started coming in from all over New Zealand after the Napier Borough Council electrical engineer, D H Hastie, sent tramway concerns a list of material for disposal.
Wanganui Tramways Corporation purchased the switch points and rails at the Chief Post Office corner (corner of Dickens and Hastings St).
With the nine trams having no saleable value as the rail gauge used in Napier was 3 feet 6 inches – different from every other system in New Zealand - their bodies ended up as shelter in the borough motor camp in February 1937 (later one would be used at the Beacon aerodrome).
In August 1937 the Napier Borough Council announced that it had disposed of all of its tramway system around New Zealand to various local bodies. The last of them – 70 rails – were taken to the Napier railway yards for removal to Wellington where they would be used there.
Twenty rails were shipped to Great Barrier Island to be used by their county council (obviously not for a tramway).
The Waitomo and Golden Bay power boards purchased 110 and 40 tons of rails, respectively.
Most of the tramways equipment, however, was sold to Wanganui Borough Council.
There was £7000 ($835,000) sitting in the Napier Municipal Tramways depreciation reserve account, and with no tramway, Mayor C O Morse advised in May 1937 that this money would go towards building the replacement municipal theatre destroyed in the 1931 Hawke's Bay earthquake.
The Hawke's Bay Motor Company's buses took over from the trams, covering most of their old routes.
Napier's tramway system remains a very nostalgic part of this city's history.
Michael Fowler (mfhistory@gmail.com) is a writer and researcher of Hawke's Bay history. Follow him on facebook.com/michaelfowlerhistory
