Genuine tram restaurant:all invited!!

From Mod Mania

Ever felt tempted to indulge an expensive novelty of dining on a tram, by paying 150 bucks a pop. One can just as easily enjoy this for no less than $10. Get on the regular tram, invite some friends and meet them at the terminus, hop on with some take out and enjoy!Through discussion, the no 96 tram is apparently in the top 10 tram sides in the world, sound good!Here is a snippet of an article I found on it, a little much I thought!

1 Tram 96 travels tracks to glory
2 ALERT ALERT NEW DEVELOPMENT OVER HERE!!!!!!!!!
3 The Resolved Night of the Great Adventure, great fun!!!
4 THE COMMENCEMENT!
5 THE MEAL
6 BINGO
7 Video

Tram 96 travels tracks to glory

IT MIGHT have just been named one of the world's top 10 tram rides, but that wasn't impressing passengers aboard the number 96 tram between St Kilda and East Brunswick yesterday.

"It gets that packed after five you can't get a seat — sometimes you can't even stand it's that packed," said Ian Bowman from Sunbury, en route to Southern Cross Station.

But if you made it on board before 5pm, it was a great journey, he said.

Few would realise how great in the eyes of outsiders: Melbourne's route 96 tram has been named in National Geographic's new Journeys of a Lifetime coffee table book, which lists the world's top 500 journeys.

Among the planet's top 10 "trolley car" rides is Melbourne's route 96.

It is a distinction shared with routes as far-flung as Hong Kong, Budapest and San Francisco. Seattle's waterfront service, run with some of Melbourne's old W-class trams, also made the list.

The route 96 tram is Melbourne's busiest, with 35,000 passengers a day. At peak times, 19 trams work the 14-kilometre route, which takes 50 minutes to travel from East Brunswick through Carlton and the CBD and then past Albert Park before finishing at Acland Street in St Kilda.

The 96 once terminated at the corner of Bourke and Spencer streets, but took over the old St Kilda train line after it closed in 1988.

ALERT ALERT NEW DEVELOPMENT OVER HERE!!!!!!!!!

hey all wanted to inform everyone that 7th of may is not good as i is my little bro's bday and must celebrate and not neglect!bloody relatives! haha but i want to discuss a day and also a tram route (image below of metropolitan tram routes of Melbourne) as I would like to organise a good destination for everyone to be able to come to without tooo much hassle. I hope everyone still into the idea im going o bring a cd player and play some nice cafe del mar so its a more enjoyable experience for all and put everyone in the mood for intellectual discussion over fine food and wi..maybe not..how about Maison (the soft drink equivalent)? I really want people who decide to come to have a really awesome time so please let me know anything that might make it more comfortable for everyone. Ill be making up trays for everyone to eat off so its more doable. PLEASEEEEEEEEEEEEE come everyone I would really love it talk to you friday!!

Hey below is an image of a web site I found that discusses the 55 tram route if interested, it describes where it travels and also the average time that it takes from stop to stop at different parts of the day.If the information is too small you can easily go to:

http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Set/9507/route55.html

and HERE is the invite I made for the night:

The Resolved Night of the Great Adventure, great fun!!!

To sum up the night was awesome fun. I will describe the night as close to reality as possible, I actually forgot to bring the cam corder that I went through hell to get, so I had to survive on my friends cameras and my phone camera, so sorry!

Ok, I will tell you that I had nerves up to my eye brows because I was frantically trying to get everything organised, but mostly because I didn't want to get thrown off the tram! Though I did have a plan B if we did, which was to go to Jacobs Reserve and finish off the meal there, it was only about 5 or 6 stops from where we were starting (the West Coburg terminus). I was formally ordained Dame Bag Lady, because of all the shit I had to lug for the Big Adventure (this is the title of the project)..Antony was no help at all by the way, I can't believe it, he came up with some "I'm an ant" excuse and went on to say that he was a eusocial insect and had to go take shitty pieces of leaf to the elusive Queen Ant. He ended up shouting at me quite aggressively that he was far too small, cerebral and embarrassed to go on with the project. Oh well. I managed.. STUFF YOU ANTONY!

Alright I had to get that off my chest, better out then in as they say.So I arrived at the depot at about 5 past 8 with my Dad and my step mum Elke and my little sister Nikkola who was a gem with helping to prepare for the night as well as my little brother Nouille thank you kids. Concurrently most of the guests arrived which included two friends from my high school, great girls called Laura and Andrea LOVE YOU GUYS!! then Jess followed, Jess I have to say thank you for being so wonderfully excited throughout! continuing on some other friends Dave and Sarah arrived arm in arm, oh so sweet! So there we were hanging out at the depot waiting for anymore people to turn up, namely Scott, because I hadn't spoken to him since the Friday and forgot to get his mobile no., so by this time was freaking out he wasn't with us. Through this time I was keeping in touch with Mayuko who tried so hard to get there GO MAYU! As well as Pete and Josh who were on the same tram on its way to the depot, which, when I heard found unusually hilarious, don't ask me why.

So the boys got to the depot and we all got on that tram,everyone helping bring the humongous Esky and tables. The tables I made a couple of days earlier which functioned as a board resting on the laps of four people, I adorned them in appropriately chosen Italian style red and white checked material and added Velcro where the plates would be set (of course the plates would have the corresponding Velcro on the bottom of them)But in hind sight I don't think the Velcro was necessary, it wasn't an earthquake, just a tram Lara!. I ordered everyone to (please) sit haha and set everything up, up to the final touches of music and flowers for decoration. I forgot to hand out the menus, but that was just an affectation any way.

There was no one on the tram for maybe the first 4 or 5 stops, but when people were innocently commuting on the 55, they did not expect the events that took place, oh no, they did not! the expressions were priceless, yet not one peep from any of them, not even the tram driver! It was not too busy at all passenger wise and everyone just funneled to the other end of the tram, keep well away commuters, crazy people eating on the tram, even though it happens every night of the week! Those people are crazy for paying 150 bucks to eat on a bloody tram, I've that much for a tram fine!Irony? all in all it probably cost be 60 bucks for 9 people to have dinner and dessert-with entertainment (Antony bailed in this area too). I served up the rice, with excellent balancing skills, which I painstakingly honed prior to the event.Oh, by this time Scott and Mayu were already on, but Scott had to sit by himself. insert:insensitive laugh. So the curry was the next step, a touch messy, but otherwise successful. Drinks and such ensued, and all happily eating.

Conversation was flowing, and so was the non-alcoholic champagne...and coke. Ange was snap happy and mayu kindly lent her camera for further documenting. Then came dessert a yummy fruit salad, people seemed to be quite comfortable even though they had a table on there laps. We had finished both courses by the time we got to Domain Interchange, and Josh had to go to catch the tram home (although he wouldn't have left if I didn't take the table off of him, I'll remember that for next time).We got to meet the lovely tram driver, who we will name Tony, no he is really called Tony, I know because he told me.Below is Tony.

The rest were still able to stay for a jolly game of Bingo. Scott won twice, conveniently I thought, lecturers really must have powers that we small people can't detect. Except through a game of bingo. So yes, that was the night, it got progressively busier on the tram, but we had packed most of it up by that time. It was an excellent success and there are even talks of another in the future.

On reflection, I probably wouldn't have tried to do the whole thing by my self, but otherwise it went pretty smoothly. I'd also probably should have organised that everyone meet at a house and then have maxi taxi take everyone to the depot, easier for the guest and host. Oh and the other thing I would have changed about last night would have been to actually remember everything, eg. the cam corder. Think lara Think. I'll give myself 10 lashings for that one. mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa!

In conclusion I would like to thank everyone who made the night what it was, especially my family for putting up with my "other side" the nasty stressed one. I hope that everyone enjoyed it and I will attempt at uploading the video I have. Mayu, I was wondering if you could upload a couple of the pics you have? just add them to this page at the bottom.