Re: Someone killed in Melbourne Loop this morning?

[David McLoughlin <davemcl@REMOVEiprolink.co.nz>]

John Wayman wrote:
> 
> I remember my old tram driver trainer tell me "You won't be a real tram
> driver until you kill someone".
> 
> I came close in three years on that job, but luckily avoided fatal accidents
> such as cars  driving into stationary trams at a terminus and deliberate
> suicides that friends of mine had to endure.


My younger brother Daryl, to my envy, got a job as a tram driver at
Preston Depot about 1989 or 1990.

He quit after only a year or two after a woman jumped in front of his
tram in St George's Road on route 11 (West Preston). He went into a
corner store opposite to call an ambulance and the shopkeeper refused to
let him use the phone. He couldn't believe the callousness which deeply
affected him as the woman wasn't dead, just smashed to gory bits and
needing urgent hospital care.

And he also didn't like the Z1s. He said their brakes were not as safe
as the Ws. He didn't want to drive Z1s. The tram he was driving when the
woman jumped at it was a W. He couldn't face the thought of something
like that happening when he was driving a Z1 which were about to take
over the West Preston run, so he quit.

David McLoughlin
Auckland New Zealand