Jecca Zane
Sandra 1The secret class struggle of our trams
August 7th 2007 04:56
Melbournian trams suffer the pain of a Victorian class system. They are forced to frequent suburbs according to their caste. It is a cruel feudal system where the quality of the tram running on each route is determined by the wealth and class of the suburbs it passes and especially that of the suburb at its extremes.
This became apparent to me when I made the switch from the West to the East like a young defecting capitalist after the fall of the Berlin wall. A move that saw a change of tram routes; from the 57 to the 109.
The old 57 tram trudges out of the city via Elizabeth Street with the youthful exuberance only a thirty year old tram can , approximately 89 in tram years. Through North Melbourne, past Flemington Racecourse, down Epsom Road (where panic stricken tram drivers scan the railway overpass for impending attacks by stone), on through Ascot Vale crossing the Mighty Maribyrnong river at the Angler’s Tavern, and finally retiring into Maribyrnong.
The West of Melbourne, the Old Swamp is the blue collar part of town; it’s also the 57’s stomping ground. It’s hood if you will. At the end of the 57 line, passengers can alight for a number of exciting tourist attractions including the Maribyrnong detention centre, High/Knife-point Shopping Centre and a sinister looking defence institution.
The new 109 tram propels itself through the Eastern Suburbs from Box Hill to Camberwell, then Kew and on into the city, slicing through it via Collins Street and taking the old Sandridge railway line to Port Melbourne.
The East of Melbourne, the home of the Toorak tractor and hotbed of skinny soy decaff latte addicts. At Station pier in Port Melbourne, where the 109 glides to a stop, there exists, as the name suggests, a Port where cousins walk hand in hand fresh from a Trans-Bass journey from Van Diemens land. It is also the place where tourists go to buy the most expensive fish and chips in town.
1979 was an exciting time. Sid Vicious died of a heroin overdose after supposedly killing his American girlfriend, Abdus Salam received one third of the Nobel Prize and ABBA released their “Greatest Hits Volume 2”. But it wasn’t all fun. The Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfares released something too: a report on drug problems that blamed alcohol for 30,000 deaths in the past ten years, most of them being road accidents. Now, if all those thirty thousand people took trams home from the pub instead of getting behind the wheel of their Kingswoods, they may have been alright. The government knew this and the need to fit 30,000 more people on to each tram would change Melbourne forever. The solution lay in a new and exciting tram called the Z3 and its extra door. Where the Z2 and the positively primitive Z1 had only two doors the Z3 had three. Now at least a third more people could get on the tram and lives would be saved.
Things were definitely looking up for the people of Melbourne, and more importantly the Westies. The Z3 made less noise than its ancestors. It had three doors like muscular chicken wings that could easily crush a small children lurking in the stairwell. The interior was painted orthopaedic beige and the seats were sticky in the summer.
When the administration of an integral part of the country’s infrastructure cuts into the long lunches, tax payer funded ski trips, name-calling question times and play dates with the Americanos that politicians enjoy so much, they have to be sold, preferably to someone foreign.
Mr Kennet knew that Privatisation was fun for everyone. New directors would be able to create exciting workplaces and marketplaces by introducing games like musical jobs and “I don’t really care that the trains don’t run on time, here’s a fare increase.”
When the tramways were privatised, the 109 got the T1000 of trams: the Citadis. According to the Chief Executive Officer of Yarra Trams: “Our vision is to revitalise tram travel in this city so Melbourne has a modern, reliable tram system and in this regard route 109 from Box Hill Central to Port Melbourne is our showcase. The combination of low-floor trams, Superstops, improved "real time" passenger information and easy access for disabled and mobility-impaired passengers has proven to be a great success and extremely popular with all of our passengers” That was lended to the ears of commuters in April 2004. As for the Z3s they weren’t to miss out, they would not only be revitalised, they would be kept on and given a new livery: a new paint job. The green and gold scrapped for Hospital waiting room: Grey, green, blue and topped off with another gray, but this one darker than the former.
Citadis is probably French for “space ant” or possibly “metal snake from space”. The Citadis is like a super bug from outside of Jupiter crossed with an accordion. Where the Z3 looks like it was found somewhere and fitted with seats, the Citadis looks like it evolved in zero gravity over billions of years. Where the driver of the Z3 sits in an outhouse, the driver of the Citadis sits in a bridge exactly like the one in the Star Trek Enterprise. The bridge has ample dials to look while he or she pushes the button for hyper drive in silence and is located in both the head and the anus of the tram.
The truth is the West missed out. Not just through the loss of myself, but the box that rattles when it exceeds ten kilometres an hour still trudging that line to Maribyrnong.
And it will never change because the look and list of features of a tram have come to resemble the same as that of the suburbs they serve. Shame on you Melbourne. What about a fair go for trams? What if the Z3 wants to go down to Port Melbourne and get some fish and chips at Rexy’s shop? Or maybe the Citadis wants to go to Marybrynong. No, that wouldn’t happen… nobody wants to go to Maribyrnong.
This became apparent to me when I made the switch from the West to the East like a young defecting capitalist after the fall of the Berlin wall. A move that saw a change of tram routes; from the 57 to the 109.
The old 57 tram trudges out of the city via Elizabeth Street with the youthful exuberance only a thirty year old tram can , approximately 89 in tram years. Through North Melbourne, past Flemington Racecourse, down Epsom Road (where panic stricken tram drivers scan the railway overpass for impending attacks by stone), on through Ascot Vale crossing the Mighty Maribyrnong river at the Angler’s Tavern, and finally retiring into Maribyrnong.
The West of Melbourne, the Old Swamp is the blue collar part of town; it’s also the 57’s stomping ground. It’s hood if you will. At the end of the 57 line, passengers can alight for a number of exciting tourist attractions including the Maribyrnong detention centre, High/Knife-point Shopping Centre and a sinister looking defence institution.
The new 109 tram propels itself through the Eastern Suburbs from Box Hill to Camberwell, then Kew and on into the city, slicing through it via Collins Street and taking the old Sandridge railway line to Port Melbourne.
The East of Melbourne, the home of the Toorak tractor and hotbed of skinny soy decaff latte addicts. At Station pier in Port Melbourne, where the 109 glides to a stop, there exists, as the name suggests, a Port where cousins walk hand in hand fresh from a Trans-Bass journey from Van Diemens land. It is also the place where tourists go to buy the most expensive fish and chips in town.
1979 was an exciting time. Sid Vicious died of a heroin overdose after supposedly killing his American girlfriend, Abdus Salam received one third of the Nobel Prize and ABBA released their “Greatest Hits Volume 2”. But it wasn’t all fun. The Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfares released something too: a report on drug problems that blamed alcohol for 30,000 deaths in the past ten years, most of them being road accidents. Now, if all those thirty thousand people took trams home from the pub instead of getting behind the wheel of their Kingswoods, they may have been alright. The government knew this and the need to fit 30,000 more people on to each tram would change Melbourne forever. The solution lay in a new and exciting tram called the Z3 and its extra door. Where the Z2 and the positively primitive Z1 had only two doors the Z3 had three. Now at least a third more people could get on the tram and lives would be saved.
Things were definitely looking up for the people of Melbourne, and more importantly the Westies. The Z3 made less noise than its ancestors. It had three doors like muscular chicken wings that could easily crush a small children lurking in the stairwell. The interior was painted orthopaedic beige and the seats were sticky in the summer.
When the administration of an integral part of the country’s infrastructure cuts into the long lunches, tax payer funded ski trips, name-calling question times and play dates with the Americanos that politicians enjoy so much, they have to be sold, preferably to someone foreign.
Mr Kennet knew that Privatisation was fun for everyone. New directors would be able to create exciting workplaces and marketplaces by introducing games like musical jobs and “I don’t really care that the trains don’t run on time, here’s a fare increase.”
When the tramways were privatised, the 109 got the T1000 of trams: the Citadis. According to the Chief Executive Officer of Yarra Trams: “Our vision is to revitalise tram travel in this city so Melbourne has a modern, reliable tram system and in this regard route 109 from Box Hill Central to Port Melbourne is our showcase. The combination of low-floor trams, Superstops, improved "real time" passenger information and easy access for disabled and mobility-impaired passengers has proven to be a great success and extremely popular with all of our passengers” That was lended to the ears of commuters in April 2004. As for the Z3s they weren’t to miss out, they would not only be revitalised, they would be kept on and given a new livery: a new paint job. The green and gold scrapped for Hospital waiting room: Grey, green, blue and topped off with another gray, but this one darker than the former.
Citadis is probably French for “space ant” or possibly “metal snake from space”. The Citadis is like a super bug from outside of Jupiter crossed with an accordion. Where the Z3 looks like it was found somewhere and fitted with seats, the Citadis looks like it evolved in zero gravity over billions of years. Where the driver of the Z3 sits in an outhouse, the driver of the Citadis sits in a bridge exactly like the one in the Star Trek Enterprise. The bridge has ample dials to look while he or she pushes the button for hyper drive in silence and is located in both the head and the anus of the tram.
The truth is the West missed out. Not just through the loss of myself, but the box that rattles when it exceeds ten kilometres an hour still trudging that line to Maribyrnong.
And it will never change because the look and list of features of a tram have come to resemble the same as that of the suburbs they serve. Shame on you Melbourne. What about a fair go for trams? What if the Z3 wants to go down to Port Melbourne and get some fish and chips at Rexy’s shop? Or maybe the Citadis wants to go to Marybrynong. No, that wouldn’t happen… nobody wants to go to Maribyrnong.
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