I have found amongst my papers an article "Lobby urges tram extensions to aVOID DEAD END TRIPS" (caps not in original!)

!5 extensions are listed as follows:

1    67 to be extended to Carnegie Station

2    3 to be extended from Malvern to East Malvern Station and then to Chadstone

3    Burke Road (72X) to be extended south to Caulfield Station

4    5 to be extended to Darling station

5    6 to be extended to Ashburton Station

6    8 to be extended to Camberwell Road

7    75 to be extended to Knox City (the rest of the Vermont South extension, only half done to date)

8    16 to be extended to Kew Junction

9    48 to be extended to Doncaster Hill (surely Doncaster shopping centre)

10    72 to be extended to Doncaster Road and then on to Ivanhoe Station

11    86 to be extended to South Morang

12    112 to be extended to Reservoir Station

13    57 to be extended to East Keilor

14    82 to be extended via Footscray Rd to Docklands and CBD

15    Park Street Track to be extended to St Kilda Road.

Some may have been overtaken by other changes as for example the heavy rail extension to South Morang.

This article was published in /The Age/ on March 6, 2013. So far as I know, nothing has been done on any of these extensions, although it now seems possible that the smallest, the Park Street extension, may be under consideration.

It is time for this list to be looked at again, and perhaps for them to be ranked in order of priority, taking into account usefulness and cost.

One of the most important extensions was omitted from the list, probably on the basis of cost, and because Victorian Railways still had their eye on their alternative very, very expensive proposal.  This is the MMTB proposal for an extension of the tramway along Alexandra Parade and the Eastern Highway to Doncaster Shopping town.  The cost figures given in the MMTB document are of course wildly out of date - inflation has taken its toll - but the MMTB reckoned that this would be a profitable line within a few years.  To be noted is that the document showed that this would be operated by the B class trams.  Also to be noted as that much of the works required to be done for the Doncaster extension have now been done, such as conversion to pantograph operation, and the CBD track connexions.

Note, some of the routes have probably been renumbered since the article was written!

Regards

Dudley Horscroft