Railways and the Waverley Area

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People who grew up in the era of personal transport in the form of motor cars find it hard to understand the great significance of the railway reaching an area. In the early days of Melbourne, and up to about the 1930s, railways were the only really viable means of transport over distances more than about 20km. Roads in those days were bumpy, rutted, dusty dirt tracks, which after heavy rain became impassible muddy swamps. Riverboats were widely used if rivers ran the right way, but these, like the bullock and horse drawn vehicles, were very slow. Railways, on the other hand, could reach at least 50km/h, more than three times the speed of all the alternatives. What was more, they could carry very large amounts of cargo, and their record of safety and reliability was much better than their competitors'.

The Waverley area was connected to Melbourne by rail in 1930. For information about the means used to get the railway into the area, see Wandering Around Waverley.

Our area has a good number of claims to fame in the railway scene. I have listed these here, but I'm sure there must be more. Anyone who knows other significant features of Waverley's railways, please tell me!

1. The railway line from East Malvern to Glen Waverley was opened in 1930. It was the only line in Melbourne to be built and electrified at once - all other electric lines (that is, the suburban network and the Gippsland main line) were built first (before the electric network had been built) and electrified later. For more information about railway electrification, see "Only Ten Percent Iron: Sir Harold Winthrop Clapp", from another of the author's web sites, Iron Horses Victoria. (Reference: The Electric Railways of Victoria, by S.E. Dornan & R.G. Henderson, published by the Australian Electric Traction Association)
2. The Glen Waverley line is now one of the best in the suburban system, but when it first opened it was considered an eyesore. A single double-ended Swing Door carriage ran the entire route, and even this could not be made to pay its way with the low patronage. An article on this portion of the history of the line appears in the March 1981 edition of Australian Railway Enthusiast magazine.
3. Sir Redmond Barry was a poineer settler in Syndal. Almost a hundred years after he named his property, in 1958, a new diesel-electric locomotive was built, numbered S308, and it was named after him. S308 had a long career in the railways, lasting in active service until October 1991 and clocking up several million kilometers of travel. It was withdrawn from service and placed inside the South Dynon locomotive workshop as a training aid for engine maintenance and repair students, with some parts removed for access so all the "vitals" could be seen. Now it resides in the Australian Railway Historical Society's museum in Williamstown, open for visitors to enter and inspect the inside.
4. Sir John Monash was a general in the Australian Army in the First World War. His name was first applied to the university whose first campus was in the Waverley area. From there it has spread much further. However, it was also applied to another diesel locomotive of the same class as S308 "Sir Redmond Barry" - the last member of the class, S317. It entered service in 1960-61 and also lasted a long time in service. In 1983, when it was over 20 years old, it was deemed worthwhile to repair it from very heavy collision damage, and it eventually returned to service with improvements such as an electric vigilance control ("dead-man equipment"), sun blinds, reduced cab noise and improved cab heaters. It is now owned by Great Northern Rail Services, a private railway operator which runs several "classic" diesel engines, and was recently restored to service.
5. Mount Waverley railway station has several claims to fame:
   • In the 1930s it was named the most attractive railway station in Victoria, because of its flower beds, trees, and overall cleanliness.
   • Early in the 1990s it was featured in the TV news because of the strange habits of a certain bird: every time a train came in, it would fly up and down peering into all the windows, as if it had lost a chick into a train!
   • In the mid-1990s it was selected as the first station to be upgraded to a "premium station" after the corporatisation of the Metropolitan Transit Authority. This involved installing closed circuit television for security, good lighting, a full booking office, and public telephones.
6. Glen Waverley station was the first to be equipped with automatic ticketing barriers. These record the unique identification numbers encoded in the magnetic strip on the Metcard tickets, and allow transport planners to work out how customers' needs could best be met. (Reference: Newsrail magazine, July 1997, p196. Newsrail is published by the Australian Railway Historical Society, Victorian Division.)
7. The section of track from East Malvern to Glen Waverley was host to Australia's first Centralised Traffic Control (CTC) system, which became operational on September 7, 1958. CTC means that instead of each section of track being controlled by its own signal box, the whole area is controlled from one central signal box, with an illuminated diagram showing the position of every train on the system. Points and signals are set electrically from the same box. (Reference: VR to '62, by Leo J Harrigan, p174-5)

If anyone is interested in railways, please visit the author's web site Iron Horses Victoria.