A REPLICA of a Keighley trolleybus which operated in the town a century ago has been formally unveiled.

The event – at the volunteer-run Trolleybus Museum, in Sandtoft, Doncaster – marked the culmination of a two-year project to recreate the Cedes-Stoll vehicle, which conveyed passengers around Keighley in post-Edwardian years.

Town mayor Councillor Peter Corkindale, accompanied by consort Mrs Susan Brown, performed the launch ceremony (pictured).

Work on the trolleybus was carried out in the Czech Republic, by a team which had already constructed a replica of a 1907 vehicle which operated in Austria.

Behind the initiative was Dave Chick, project manager at the Trolleybus Museum.

“The Czech team offered to build a replica for the museum and it was decided that the most interesting trolleybus of the type was the 1911 vehicle which spent most of its life in Keighley – where it was known as ‘the Austrian car’ because its chassis was built in Vienna,” he said.

A specification was drawn-up and Mr Chick visited the works several times during the project to liaise with the team and view progress.

He said he was delighted with the finished vehicle and paid tribute to those involved in the venture.

The original trolleybus operated in Keighley between 1913 and 1924.

At the unveiling of the replica vehicle, Cllr Corkindale said the Cedes-Stoll system was viewed at the time as the best available and the council had wanted something different to that installed in Bradford in 1911.

He also described how the council only had a single set of wires on each route, which meant that when two vehicles travelling in opposite directions met, the cables had to be unplugged and handed over.

Cllr Corkindale said: “When this happened on one of Keighley’s steep hills, if a driver didn’t catch the cable properly the ‘troller’ – which ran on top of the wires – would go careering off down the hill and had to be brought back by a lad on a horse!”