Driving down Melbourne’s Swanston Street is something that wasn’t been possible since 1992: the year when the section between Flinders and La Trobe Streets was closed to private cars and redeveloped as Swanston Street Walk. If you can’t remember what the journey was like back then, here is a video from 1988 (via Youtube).
In 1999 the street was partially reopened, with cars being allowed in between 7pm and 7am each day. The final change occurred in 2011 when cars were again banned, in conjunction with the construction of four new platform stops for tram passengers.
Despite the ban, some interstate people still try to drive down Swanston Street, like this car with South Australian registration plates.
This tourist in their campervan also seemed a tad lost…
[…] Swanston Street: once upon a time you could drive down it, until last year when four new platform stops were built to make it easier for passengers to board […]
You can forgive people who are not familiar with the area, but local people used to use it deliberately and park as well. They still do at night between Lonsdale and Little Bourke.
Why do you link a video on this page and then make it private so we can’t see it?
When I posted this entry back in August 2011 the video was public – the owner (which isn’t me) must have changed the visibility of it since then. Bit of a bummer, isn’t it?
He musta changed it back since, that was a glorious 4 minutes.
You’re right – rather odd!