Richard Youl wrote:

> Most if not all Melbourne short workings had ceased by the time I started in 1987. Certainly South Melbourne had none.


When I was a kid in Melbourne, in the 60s and 70s, there were lots of daytime weekday shortworkings. Ones I well recall were Deepdene 45 (on the Mont Albert 42 route), North Fitzroy Park St 95 (on the East Brunswick 96), Coburg 20 (to Bell St on the 19 North Coburg), Niddrie 49 (on the Essendon Airport 59), Northcote Dundas St (on the East Preston 88) and doubtless more.

They were all IIRC on the busiest routes, so routes like those along St Kilda Road did not have many. Every second tram went to the shortworking.

One odd one was the St Georges Rd route, Every second tram went to West Preston 11 , with every other going to Northcote via St Georges Road 9 over the Hump to the Plenty Rd-High Street junction, a remnant of the electric line to East Preston which went via St Georges Rd until trams replaced the former Bourke St to High St buses in 1956.

Then of course there were all the St Kilda Road extras that ran via Kings Way and William Street in the peaks, as well as Latrobe Street peak extras from North Balwyn and Mont Albert.

I think of all these short-workings, only the Mont Albert via Latrobe St peak extras remain.

david mcl, knows nothing