We were sent this image of Devonport Road, in Stoke Village (previously known as Tavistock Road) that shows the high street without any cars!
One of the big difference you might notice are the changes in transportation between then and now. In the historical photograph, we can see people walking, people using horses & carts, and people using a tram with visible tram tracks running up and down what is now Devonport Road – and not a car in sight!
Here’s a “Now & Then” photo of the street, shared by Adrian Trace on the Plymouth Street Scenes facebook group in 2021, showing a bus stop, parked cars, cars driving and no pedestrians.
In 1900, there were only 700 – 800 cars in the whole of Great Britain, so driving was very uncommon, expensive and exclusive.1 At that time, people in Stoke would have been more likely to travel by walking, bicycle or horse & cart.
In the 1902 Kelly’s Directory, we can find 23 different Cycle Dealers, Agents or Manufacturers across the three towns of Plymouth, Devonport & Stonehouse, who would have supplied local people with bicycles2. Below you’ll see present-day photos of the buildings that were home to 3 local cycle agents in Stoke & Morice Town.
If you look at the historic photo again, you’ll also see that A.H. Ralph & Son have a large painted advert on the end wall of the building that is now known as 75 Devonport Road (currently home to Kelly Shenton Nail Academy & Salon) – advertising their additional services as ironmongers, sanitary plumbers, water engineers, and general smiths.
In 1902, they had premises at both 64 & 66 Tavistock Road (now 67 & 71 Devonport Road), and a smithing workshop on York Place.
In the background of the historic photograph, we can also see a tram traveling up the street. Between 1872 – 1945, trams were a key type of transport for people living in Plymouth. Stoke was connected to the network in 1901 by the Devon & District Tramway, which ran electrified trams (powered by Devonport Corporation’s power station at Stonehouse Creek, now Victoria Park) on routes between Fore Street, Devonport > through Stoke > Milehouse > Peverell > Mutley > (old) Theatre Royal.
The main tram depot was established at Milehouse (where the Plymouth CityBus depot now stands) in 1922, after the last tram lines were laid along Alma Road. You can also still see the Plymouth Corporation Tramway Offices today – a large red brick building at the Milehouse Junction, now used as the headquarters of Plymouth Citybus.
When people were traveling from Stoke to the city centre by tram, the Plymouth they stepped off in would have looked almost unrecognisable from the city we know today!
These changes are due to the significant war damage in the city centre during WWII, and the implementation of Patrick Abercrombie & Paton Watson’s ‘A Plan For Plymouth’.
Why don’t we have trams in Stoke Village anymore?
By 1930, most of the tramlines and trams needed significant repair or replacement3. Plymouth Corporation decided to implement a ten-year programme to replace the trams by motor buses, which had become more comfortable and reliable since the mass-production of pneumatic tyres4 and development of new motor-bus designs in 1924.
The Devonport to St Budeaux line was the first to have its trams replace by new double-deck buses (in October 1930), and in 1935 the Milehouse to Devonport tram line closed, following the delivery of Plymouth’s first diesel-engined buses. The complete switch-over from trams to busses was delayed during World War 2 (because busses required imported fuel, rather than locally generated electricity) and the one remaining tram route at that time, from Theatre to Peverell, was kept running until 1945.5
By 1930, there had also been a dramatic increase in the number of privately owned cars – with 1 million cars on British roads.6
In another of Adrian Trace’s Now & Then photographs, we can see an early car owner driving down Molesworth Road, towards Eldad Hill (in the area then known as Millbridge).
Notice the quality of the unpaved road, the horse & cart further up the road, and horse droppings on the road in front of the car!
By 1941, when Patrick Abercrombie & Paton Watson’s ‘A Plan For Plymouth’ was being drafted for the city, travel by car & bus were prioritised, and Plymouth’s new neighbourhoods were designed to be reached via a series of ring roads and bypasses7. These planning decisions, coupled with the continued popularity of private car ownership between 1950s-2020s, and decreasing rates of public transport use and active travel (eg cycling and walking) bring us the high levels of vehicle traffic (and accompanying noise/air pollution, and parking problems) we experience in Stoke today.
Contributors:
- Rachel Dobbs
References:
- National Motor Museum – What was the first motor car to run on the British Highway? https://nationalmotormuseum.org.uk/ufaqs/what-was-the-first-motor-car-to-run-on-the-british-highway/ ↩︎
- Kelly’s Directory of Devon & Cornwall 1092 – https://specialcollections.le.ac.uk/digital/collection/p16445coll4/id/277322/rec/1 ↩︎
- Wikipedia – Tramways in Plymouth: Closure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tramways_in_Plymouth#Closure ↩︎
- Tyre history at a glance https://www.k-online.com/en/Media_News/News/Tyre_history_at_a_glance ↩︎
- Wikipedia – Tramways in Plymouth: Closure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tramways_in_Plymouth#Closure ↩︎
- National Motor Museum – What was the first motor car to run on the British Highway? https://nationalmotormuseum.org.uk/ufaqs/what-was-the-first-motor-car-to-run-on-the-british-highway/ ↩︎
- The Box (~2019) Plymouth: From Destruction To Construction – History Resource – https://www.theboxplymouth.com/storage/plymouth-from-destruction-to-construction-ks2-3-1580921004.pdf ↩︎