Old Sydney Tram Remnants

[lunchbox]

OFF-TRAM-ROUTE ROSETTES
There are two on Kent Street, between Bathurst and Druitt, one on the corner of Druitt and Kent, and one in Goulburn St., between Sussex and Dixon.

[boronia]

Then they won't be tram remnants.

[matthewg]

Then they won't be tram remnants.

The same method of attachment was used to hold up street lighting. There are two levels of Rosettes on the façade of the YMCA building at Loftus. The high one was for a street light, not suspending the tramway overhead.

[2112Y]

I do remember that it used to have street lights that hung between buildings in the city during the late 60's and early 70's until replaced by modern street lighting.

[lunchbox]

The current exhibition of old Sydney maps at Customs House is worth a visit from tram fans. One of the maps appears to show a siding in Albion Street, off the Crown Street line. Keenan doesn't mention it. Are there any other references to it?

[lunchbox]

PHOTOS....
State Library has a photo exhibition (Sept. 2019) of the exhumation of Devonshire Street Cemetery, using steam trams, and the construction of Sydney Central Station.

[lunchbox]

YARRA JUNCTION.
Looking south toward La Perouse, at the intersection of Anzac Parade and Canara Ave. Phillip Bay, on 11.9.19. The curved rockface follows the alignment of what was the Sprinvale Line turnout.

[lunchbox]

SPRINGVALE LINE.
The side wall of 1a Yarra Road is stepped in order to follow the curved property boundary of what was the Springvale Line, climbing the hill toward Yarra Junction. Taken 11.9.19.

[lunchbox]

SPRINGVALE LINE.
This depression in the bush, about 90m SE of the Bunnerong Rd. / Military Rd. junction appears to be the remains of the southern end of the Springvale Line cutting. This section of the line was closed in 1935. Further investigation would require some serious bush slashing. The white markers roughly define the track centreline. Taken 11.9.19.

[lunchbox]

SPRINGVALE LINE

The little tram bridge over what I will call Yarra Creek (between Little Bay Rd. and Yarra Rd) was built for the opening of the Springvale line in 1902. The line was closed in 1935 when the bridge was found to be structurally unsound (Keenan). The abutment(s ?) subsequently fell into the stream. I photographed the remains there (seen here) in August 2009.

[boronia]

The tracks from Matraville to Yarra Junction were pretty much intact into the late 1950s. I walked along it a couple of times. There was a deviation off Bunnerong Rd behind the sandhill near Military Rd, then it crossed over to the cemetery side near Little Bay Rd.

Much of the Tram Museum's early track came from this area.

[Stu]

Slightly off topic: there is a small bridge over Bunnerong Creek next to Military Rd near Bumborah Pt Rd, Port Botany that has sleepers and rails attached. Google maps shows the rails are visible in the short grass/dirt. This corridor passes behind STA Port Botany Depot and is over grown with grass and mostly trees, it appears to be in the Ports Authority owned land that is leased to TYNE ACFS container depot.

Looking at photos of the former Bunnerong power station, it looks like the branch line from the nearby and current goods line.

[lunchbox]

^^^It is indeed one of the Bunnerong Power Station sidings. It's extant behind the Admin building in Botany Cemetery. There's a recent pic in the "Where is it" thread.

[boronia]

There was a line across Military Rd that served to oil refinery next to the cemetery.

[lunchbox]

^^^^^^^I recall it as the Total Oil depot. It would have been a steep climb from Foreshore Road! Lindsaybridge has a photo of it, probably on the Flikr website.

[tonyp]

For want of a better thread and regarding the trams themselves as remnants, here is some very good footage just posted by Greg Travers of a whole range of Sydney trams at the 2011 anniversary at STM:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN2W5kjORpk

[boronia]

The last of the 2G trams left Hunter St at 2.48PM on 25/2/1961 to LaPerouse; returned to Kensington at 3.45 PM passing Daceyville Junction around 4.08 PM

A small group plan to mimic this last run by catching an L3 from Wynyard around the same time tomorrow to Juniors; returning on an L3 to Moore Park around 4.08, catching an L2 to the racecourse and walking up to Darley Rd.

Participants welcome.

[lunchbox]

A bit of rail-head has popped up out of the bitumen on Great North Road, near the intersection of Rokeby Road, Abbotsford.

[Swift]

I'm disgusted how efficiently Sydney covered up it's tramway past, yet it's so ineffectual in most other areas I wish it was.

[Glen]

Sorry if these have been posted before:

https://www.bondivillage.com/trams-bondi.htm

https://www.bondivillage.com/trams-glebe.htm

https://www.bondivillage.com/trams-newtown.htm

https://www.bondivillage.com/trams-east.htm

[tonyp]

Another extract from the Sydney Tramway Museum's "Shooting Through" DVD. The video covers the Watsons Bay and Eastern lines which were the busiest tram routes in Australia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtiCPcOy7bs

The Watsons Bay line was a remarkable operation, run since the 1930s by modern corridor cars at headways down to 40 seconds in the pm peak and generally not more than 1-5 minutes apart. This sort of intensity was only made possible by looped termini in the city, first at Erskine St and later at Queens Square. Not all services went to Watsons Bay, many being shortworked to Double Bay and Rose Bay.

Note the opening comment that the terminus loop at Queens Square was only 14 metres radius, not an unusual radius on a traditional system where a "gentle" city block curve is considered to be about 18 metres. Obviously today's fixed bogie trams, which struggle even at 25 metres, can't be used on such systems, while modern low-floor articulated trams with swivelling bogies,like the Skoda 15T can run curves down to 15-18 metres and keep moving swiftly over those curves and grades like those old Sydney trams. The tram world has now divided into two, with most of the new systems being slower and less efficient.

The government briefly closed the Watsons Bay line in 1949, replacing it with buses, causing such a public uproar, they had to reopen it in 1950. After that, they adopted a policy of tearing down the overhead wires the night they closed a line. None of the closures were popular, both public and councils flooding the government with complaints. Many lines such as these were also profitable to the very end, something that the replacement bus services were never to achieve. Nowadays New South Head Rd east of Edgecliff is served only very 10 to 15 minutes by buses with half the capacity of the trams they replaced. The route was transformed from something gigantic to something miniscule (until the train to Edgecliff came and at least picked up the inner section).

Similar issues of scale applied to the Bondi line which was served by 240 passenger coupled sets running every 1-2 minutes in peaks, providing the route with more than three times the capacity of the present articulated bus service. Incidentally, that grade they refer to up Phillip St from Circular Quay maxed at 8.3%. It took electric trams to extend the line down to CQ. The steam trams had to terminate up the top at Bridge St (as would the Alstoms and CAFs!).

Personally, I sometimes think the greatest loss to NSW was the expertise, leaving us transformed from world-leading to the dunce on L plates.

Interesting fact: most of these lines were originally engineered across open countryside or early tracks and urban development followed them, but Birriga Rd was created for urban development but designed with curves and grades (max 40 metres and 6.7% respectively) suitable for a tram line, which was subsequently built along it. Nowadays, it never seems to get considered as a route from Bondi Junction to Bondi (the latter was reached via Curlewis St).

[Rclasstramcar]

/Users/user/Desktop/186527021_10208350502917821_5125888768248445691_n.jpg
My photograph from a few months ago, when I visited Watsons Bay with two friends. It shows the section on the approach to 'The Gap'.

[Guy_Arab]

SOMEONE WOULD HAVE A TRACK MAP TRY TRAMWAY AT LOFTUS
GUY ARAB (PETS WA )

[Swift]

I saw a video on a Guy Arab bus wIth Gardner 6LW. Never heard what a Guy Arab sounded like before. One of the best sounding buses I've ever heard.
Can't believe Hong Kong were lucky to see them in daily service up to the late 1990s.

Back to the trams...

[boronia]

SOMEONE WOULD HAVE A TRACK MAP TRY TRAMWAY AT LOFTUS
GUY ARAB (PETS WA )

Plenty to chose from on the web