Re: Adelaide Tram Destination Rolls

Neil Waller (nwaller@denr.sa.gov.au)
Thu, 01 May 1997 08:29:41 +0930

Chris Brownbill wrote:
>
> As I was idly wandering around Melbourne City streets on my lunch break
> today I noticed a window display in the "High And Mighty" clothing store
> in Little Collins Street (Centrepoint Arcade) featuring very prominently
> six destination rolls from what I assume to be Adelaide trams. The
> destinations include Morialta, Rostrevor, Hackney, Magill, Paradise,
> West Beach, Glydne, Walkerville North, St Peters, Kingswood etc etc. It
> really looks good.
>
> But, I'm curious about these rolls because they also contain the
> following destinations to which trams did not run: Northfield and
> Firle. Also, they contained a 'destination' of FULL, and the
> traditional Adelaide minimum fare indications of Minimum 15c and Minimum
> 20c. But thinks I, the guts of Adelaide's trams were closed in 1958,
> decimal currency was introduced in 1966 - what's going on here? Could
> these be bus desto rolls showing 95% tram destinations or are they good
> fakes with a glaring error?

If the minimum fare is in cents then the rolls are not from the trams
but rather
from the old Leyland 3-door buses that the MTT ran as tram
replacements. These buses
were not replaced until well into the 1970's by Volvos of which many are
still in
service.

These rolls were available for a couple of dollars each from the MTT
when
destination numbers were introduced and the network expanding so rapidly
with
the take over in the mid 1970's of privately run outer suburban services
forced
their abandonment.

Adelaide buses carried only route numbers for a number of years until
buses with
electronic destination signs were introduced.

The Adelaide bus services replaced tram services in the first instance
and in
many cases ran beyond the old tram termini.

Indeed up until very recently the old through-working of the trams was
reflected
in the through working of the buses - nothing changed in a sense.

It was only with the awarding of the service contract in the inner north
area
to Serco that this was broken between northern destinations and southern
destinations.


-- 
Neil Waller	(nwaller@denr.sa.gov.au)
Department of Environment and Natural Resources, South Australia
Telephone:	Oz: (08) 8204 9218; International: (618) 8204 9218
Mail:		GPO Box 1047, ADELAIDE 5001     Australia


Unless explicitly attributed, the opinions expressed are personal and
not
those of DENR or the South Australian Government.