Re: Re: Panto on SW5.856

If everything was well maintained, pole trams would be fine. But it has
never been thus in Melbourne. Trams with low tension spring
poles.....disastrous and bounce off at every frog. Unmentioned
overheads.....ok if you want to go in the direction that the tram usually
goes, but please do not ask it to go another way. It will surely come off.
Ropes wrapping around the hook on the roof......awful to untangle. Ropes
getting hooked on headlight or foot pegs. Whole poles and bases coming off
and falling, hopefully on the road, but could fall onto a car of person.
Trying to teach four feet tall Asian female tram drivers to swing a pole to
reverse position, hard work (nothing against short female Asian tram
drivers, I know a couple of very good ones).

A personal experience.......at Gardiner on the number 72 Camberwell route
before the freeway was constructed, it was a very tight turn. A car was
forward of the stop line and I asked him to move back so that the tram could
turn unhindered. He obliged, but as the tram turned, the head of the pole
fell off and went straight through his windscreen and landed in his
passenger seat. Someone could have been killed as the pole heads would have
been a kilo at least. Around the Conner, I gave him contact details and
while this was all very serious, he happened to be going to a fancy dress
party and was dressed in a cat suit with a very long tail. He was amazingly
calm about it all.

Pole trams may be historically accurate but quite impractical for modern
days. So much money has been saved, so much lost time saved, so much
passenger inconvenience saved, so much driver stress saved by having pantos.

Having said that, the present day W's are an abortion of a tram. They used
be a great and fast means of transport. Now they are crammed with
technology and very safe. But ever so slow. As they are, I really don't
think the W's have a place in a modern efficient tram system.
----- Original Message -----
From: <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, December 21, 2002 7:27 PM
Subject: [TramsDownUnder] Re: Panto on SW5.856

W Classes and Pantos, we tried this once before and it failed,

why all

of

a sudden do they think it will work again.,

No idea. I'm disappointed really, because W's are pole trams.

They always

have been, and always should be. The arguments against poles are

driver

convenience (ie lazy drivers) and overhead alignment.

The W's have been modified so heavily over the last 5-10 years they

are

beginning to lose their charm.

Sorry Andy,

But I take offence to the "Lazy Drivers" comment, I train people on
these cars every day and, you obviously have not had to try and
retrieve a damaged pole with a broken rope in the middle of a city
intersection, it's not about being lazy, it's downright dangerous and
it really screws up the service! It was mentioned it was tried before
and didn't work, rubbish, it was tried on car 891 and the union nuked
it because of the way the pan was raised and lowered, the pan worked
fine.

As for their character, as an enthusiast, I too like poles on the
cars but, we have a system that is 95% panto and need to have the
overhead modified to better suit the pans to stop expensive damage
and excessive wear being caused by frogs and the like.

Until the 70's, Milan's cars were all pole and looked lovely now,
with pantos, they still look lovely, you just get used to it, the
charater of the car is more than just the poles, it is the only way
we will keep them in service.

And please, don't sink to blaming driver's for this, it has nothing
to do with them at all!

Citadis




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