Re: Official launch in Bendigo of restored Sydney tram R 1808

[David McLoughlin <davemcl@NO***damned***SPAMiprolink.co.nz>]

Paul Nicholson wrote:

> "Ian Jelf" <ian@bluebadge.demon.co.uk> wrote in message

>>  Does S8ir Robert Risson have anything named in *his* honour?

 
> Not that I am aware of.
> His contribution to Melbourne trams in the 1960s should be recognised.
> However, there are some people who believe it was an earlier Chairman of the
> MMTB, H H Bell, who "saved" Melbourne from the anti-tram epidemic that
> covered the English-speaking world in the 1950s.

Paul, Sir Robert Risson was chairman or deputy chairman of the MMTB from
1949 until 1970. He was the one who fought the anti-tram factions, he
got the Footscray lines connected to the main system, had the Latrobe St
line built, had the Bourke Street bus routes converted in a major
project to electric trams despite hysteria in the media about it, and
had a couple of hundred new trams built.

Despite those amazing achievements, carried out when the press was full
of anti-tram hysteria and while tramway systems elsewhere in Australia
and in the UK and North American were falling like Autumn leaves, I
think his greatest achievement was leaving a major tramway system in
good physical condition and ready for expansion when the anti-tram tide
turned in the early 1970s.

Melbourne's tramway system is the greatest possible monument to Sir
Robert Risson.

David McLoughlin
Auckland New Zealand