in April 1951. However, in spring 1950, the Highways Committee was presented by the Mayor with the concept of running trams between East Croydon station and the new estate being constructed at New Addington. This was based on the fact that the Feltham cars used in Croydon were going to Leeds to serve their new estates on reserved tracks. In 1962 a private study, with assistance from BR engineers, showed how easy it was to convert the West Croydon - Wimbledon train service to tram operation and successfully prevent conflict between trams and trains. These two concepts became joined in joint LRTL/TLRS concept of New Addington to Wimbledon every 15 mins via East and West Croydon and Mitcham plus New Addington to Tattenham Corner every 15 mins via East and West Croydon, Sutton and Epsom Downs. A branch into Forestdale to give an overlap service from Sutton was also included. During the 1970s, several BR directors and up-and-coming managers were aware of the advantages. In fact, Peter Parker was very well aware of this even before becoming chairman. Chris Green, upon becoming managing director, Network South East, published his plans in 1987 expanding the concept to take in the Tattenham Corner and Caterham branches and provide a service from Croydon to Lewisham via Addiscombe and Hayes. Working with Tony Ridley, then managing director, London Transport, the scheme was brought out into the open, and Scott Mackintosh was appointed Light Rail Manager in 1989. The scheme was accepted in principle in February 1990 by Croydon Council, which worked with what was then London Regional Transport (LRT) to propose Tramlink to Parliament, resulting in the Croydon Tramlink Act 1994 giving LRT the legal power to build and run Tramlink. The new Act still incorporated major parts of the 1870 Tramways Act which had held back previous private tram companies. However, as most of the routes affected were managed by the same authority, the obligation to maintain the road surface was not a new cost. Tramlink operates with modern articulated tramcars of Bombardier low-floor design called CR4000, based upon the K4000 type of the Cologne Stadtbahn, with the tram units numbered from 2530. This number was the next in sequence from the last London tram, number 2529, withdrawn in 1952. Since it opened on 11 May 2000, the 38 km of track have been operated by FirstGroup on behalf of Transport for London