On 18 October 2018 Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were visiting Melbourne, with Yarra Trams part of the flurry of activity by taking them on a tram ride down to South Melbourne Beach.
Photo by AFP / Getty Images via Daily Mail
Two B2 class trams were specially prepared at Brunswick Depot for the overseas guests, being stripped of advertisements and then transferred via Swanston Street to South Melbourne Beach, lead by a Victoria Police escort.
With Victoria Police officers hiding onboard.
And tailed by a Yarra Trams operation crew.
To make way for the circus, passengers on route 1 trams were getting turfed off at the corner of Park and Clarendon Street.
Trams were then turned back towards the city.
With Yarra Trams failing to provide a replacement service, or even acknowledge the reason why the trams were not running.
Some people get all the luck!
Photo by Getty Images via Daily Mail
Ian Green on Vicsig has a photo of tram B2.2088 and entourage headed through South Melbourne bound for the route 1 terminus.
A note on the trams selected
You might think that if you were taking a visitor to Melbourne on a tram ride, you’d choose an ‘iconic’ W class.
Or the pride of the fleet – the brand new E class.
But Yarra Trams served up a piece of the 1980s – the high floor B2 class.
The trams selected were pretty long in the tooth – B2.2088 did the honours carrying the royal pair and was 26 years old, while backup tram B2.2020 was even older, at 29 years of age.
So why did those two get picked?
B2.2020 was one of the early B2 class trams to pass through the $21 million B2 class tram life extension project, so was withdrawn from service on 16 October to receive a spit and polish, while tram B2.2088 was withdrawn from service in March 2018 to receive the same treatment, and was so ‘factory fresh’ to carry the royal pair.
A summary of the upgrades received can be seen here.
And Melbourne’s other royal tram
For her 2011 Melbourne visit Queen Elizabeth also rode on a Melbourne tram – a specially painted Z3.158.
Maybe high floor trams were selected on both occasions to give the assembled crowds a better view of the famous passenger?
A W would have been much nicer !
I can only think they chose a Z (!) and now a B because Yarra Trams think W’s are old and slow and might break down, though the ones that are now W8s have very new mechanicals, so whu ? maybe cos theyve got bigger windows ? Though not that much bigger.
Unreliable W class trams are no longer a problem – in October 2018 Yarra Trams withdrew the last non-upgraded trams from service, leaving the City Circle services to struggle on with just a handful of upgraded W8 trams to run it.
https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/about-ptv/media-centre/media-releases/new-life-for-melbournes-historic-w-class-trams/
With the restaurant trams also yanked from service a few weeks later:
https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/tram-restaurant-grinds-to-a-halt-after-failing-safety-test-20181020-p50avm.html
I had no idea the Z and B class were being upgraded for a life-extension. That’s a slap in the face for Victorians with disabilities.
At the rate we’re going the Melbourne tram network won’t even make the 2032 DDA/DSAPT accessibility compliance deadline!