Thread: old brisvegas tram pics

Fantastic pics Dave, Where on earth did you get these?

My main hobby is all things rail but electrics trams and light rail are my first preference and the old the better and those pics are great bit of Brisbane’s history.

See the fintail Mercedes hiding behind the tram.





Ok. I'll be quiet now.

Originally Posted by Brian Hjelm

Hi Ho Har. Did it all from memory. Dead easy. Spent a lot of time on Brisbane trams as a kid. Unequalled way to get around the city. You could go from anywhere on one tram line to anywhere on any other without having to walk more than one CBD block between lines. Idiot politicians scrapped the whole system.

Thank goodness Brian, can you imagine the chaos they would cause today? They were good in their day, when Brisbane ended at Chermside. Mt Gravatt and Moorooka, but they're all inner suburbs now.
Busses can overtake each other, run express services, make detours and run past the old tramline terminii.
The only downside to BCC busses, in comparison to trams, is people who have never driven anything bigger than a Ford Festiva find themselves steering a 40' long box.

Originally Posted by V8Ian

Thank goodness Brian, can you imagine the chaos they would cause today?

Hi V8Ian, sorry mate but that argument does hold water.

Every city that has trams, particularly when the trams are given priority in specific areas, like Melbourne, would have a far greater problem if they did away with their trams, and more and more cities are now turning to tram and light rail networks to over come their traffic problems.

Can you imagine afternoon peak, driving from the RBH to Chermside, all the traffic having to stop behind the trams at each and every stop. To expect the population to catch public transport is silly. I have a mate who lives in Pine Rivers and works at Eagle Farm, he enjoys public transport, but to utilise it to and from work requires him to be away from the house for thirteen hours, as opposed to just over nine if he drives. Not encouraging for reluctant commuters.
What killed trams in Brisbane was the Paddington depot fire, where a considerable percentage of the fleet was destroyed. Brisbane bought in busses, old and new from where ever they could get them. At the same time Brisbane was rapidly expanding with comuters travelling from Caboolture/Pine Rivers, Logan and Ipswich. The cost of expanding the infrastructure to suit the new population structure would have been prohibitive.

In Melbourne, we love our trams. Can you imagine replacing each tram with eighty cars?

Hi again V8Ian, and again, that dog don’t hunt. The fire at Paddington has always been viewed as suspicious and was very convenient at the time because a number of companies were attempting to get the city to increase it’s bus numbers.

Surprising that these companies then did quite well out the fire.

Sydney went the same way, after “advantages” being offered by a number of companies. The end result was one of the worlds largest tram net works was scrapped, not because it was unpopular or patronage had dropped, it was scrapped because of the corrupt behaviour of the state government of the time.

As to the claims busses are better, not so. While they are initially cheaper to set up, as compered to establishing a tram network from scratch, the operating cost is far lower to maintain and operate trams verses buses, plus trams tend to have a much longer operational life span, again reducing cost and are now seen as the ONLY cost effective people movers in many cities around the world.

The only transport system that is capable of moving more people is a subway but are far more costly to establish and are limited to where they can be used, whereas if there is a street, a tram can be used.

As Mike pointed out, a single tram can replace up to 80 cars and when you take into account the number of people that can be moved in these newer longer bending trams, if you had these instead of buses, you would be giving way to two trams at an intersection for every for every 6 to 8 buses they relpace, so traffic would be a lot lower.

The figures from all over the world do not match your scepticism of tram and light rail networks.

the fire at paddo was a disaster waiting to happen tho i have no idea about it being deliberately set.

the timber structure was soaked in diesel and other oils

i lived at the bottom of the hill from it on the southern side, at that time and remember well the noise heat and carry on that night.

if my memory serves me rightly there was a prang between two fire trucks on the corner of elena st and fernberg road as units rushed to fight the fire...

us kids thought it the fire was great...

made many pennies selling old conductors change machines and the like that managed to find their way in to our hands over the coming weeks...

will never forget the smell it hang around for weeks....

had a young couple bring the pics in as they heard from someone that i would be able to help them identify where they were taken etc etc

so wanted confirmation i was right / wrong before telling them..

luck would have it i was only wrong on the holland park one but i rarely went to that side of the river so that isnt too surprising.