Author: Philip Mallis
Things to be grateful for
It’s the beginning of a new year, and sometimes I think that us gunzels complain about things just a little too much. Often these are perfectly valid and being introspective is a very important thing. However, we should also take the opportunity to appreciate what we have as well. Remember – “public transport is always…
Tram roundabouts of Melbourne
With 85 percent of Melbourne’s tram network mixed with general traffic, it is inevitable that they will have to pass through some interesting intersections. In Melbourne, there are 19 roundabouts that have tram track running through them. They are almost all located in the inner south-east (Middle Park, St Kilda, South Melbourne, etc.) or the…
Are more people living in apartments now than in 1954?
65 years ago the Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works (MMBW) released the Melbourne Metropolitan Planning Scheme. This formed the foundations for our current planning system. Some aspects, like car parking requirements, remain exactly the same. Combing through the Scheme and its background reports yield some fascinating insights for what town planners considered to be…
Station patronage in Melbourne for 2005-2019
While accountants may be excited by the end of a financial year, gunzels get excited for another reason – new station patronage data! Using the same method as last year, I have asked for and obtained the latest 2018-19 patronage data from the Department of Transport. I’m still waiting for V/Line station data, although I…
Crossing the Rubicon
Last week I crossed the Rubicon River on a hike in north-central Victoria. Unlike Julies Caesar, doing so didn’t start a war. The main reason for this trip was to have a good poke around one of the oldest hydroelectric power stations in the state. You have probably heard of Hazelwood, Loy Yang and Bald…
What happened to the closed schools of the 1990s? Part 2
Read Part 1 here. Keysborough Primary School The original school in this area was opened in 1869 and moved to this cosy country school building in 1874. Not to be confused with the present-day Keysborough Primary School which opened separately in 2010 when Coomoora Primary and Keysborough Park Primary Schools merged. What the site is…
The shopping strips of Reservoir
Just before the prominence of private cars engrained itself into Melbourne’s urban planning after the Second World War, Reservoir went through a major housing expansion. Although there was some European settlement in the area before the post-war boom, much of the suburb remained undeveloped or underdeveloped in 1945. But just one year later, hundreds of…
Victoria’s rocket playgrounds
Googie architecture (1950s, 60s and 70s) has not been preserved as well as other periods in Melbourne and Victoria. Many of the examples of this brief but fascinating time in design have been lost to the winds of time. One of the lingering and somewhat surprising artefacts from this period is the famous rocket-shaped tower…
Day trip to Lake Iseo
Note: this post was written in August 2017 during my trip to Europe. My three days spent in the north of Italy were nowhere near enough. But I did spend my second day staying in the city of Bergamo to pay a visit to one of the many nearby lakes. View Larger Map I decided…