Re: Tram Announcements: another Victorian election conspiracy theory

["Michael Walker" <walker@hotkey.net.au>]

>The point made 1000 times is that people in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide
>and myriads of other places around the world have no problems with using
>validators, automatic barriers etc, yet some (possibly large) subset of
>the people of Melbourne want to distinguish themselves from the rest of
>the world by claiming it is outrageously difficult or unreasonable.
>
It appears in the 40 years without trams, Sydney people are making all sorts
of claims about how they always validate and are good little boys and girls.

Maybe some of you don't remember when Sydney removed conductors from their
trams and introduced an honesty box system advertised at the time by (I
think) Chips Rafferty. The system was a dismal failure because people didn't
pay and they were eventually removed and conductors reinstated. If you don't
believe me, visit the tram museum at Loftus, as at 1994 there was some info
there about it.

For the record I always validate on the basis that it is no different to
validating your ticket with a conductor. However it can also be said that
Sydney people at the time of the conductorless trams not only didn't
validate, they didn't even pay their fare!