ASK Wayne Taylor if he has a favourite Bendigo tram, and there’s a distinct twinkle in the man’s eye.
“Number 19. They call it The Lady, it’s a beautiful little tram,” he smiles.
Wayne is one of nine tradesmen employed by the Bendigo Trust to lovingly and painstakingly breathe life back into vintage trams.
But he’s walking, talking proof that it’s not only the rattlers that receive a new lease on life at this workshop.
Eleven years ago Wayne, a fitter and machinist by trade, fronted up at the workshop as a work for the dole participant. And here he stayed.
“After I finished, the manager asked if I’d like a full-time job. I said yes please!” he says.
“I was an automotive machinist before this; it’s all similar but this is more interesting.
“You think about the trams while you’re working on them.”
Gallery: Bendigo Tram Depot
Wayne says he never forgets a tram, although some are more memorable than others.
“A couple of years ago we did one up for Sydney, it was a rotten wooden thing when it came in and now it’s their pride and joy. Remember The J, Denis?,” Wayne asks fellow tradie Denis Rodda.
“It had a smoking compartment.”
It seems all trams have a story to tell, if you look and listen close enough.
“When they first come in we find tram tickets inside and old newspapers. You think, people were reading those papers when the tram was running around as public transport.”
Tram number 84 is now notorious for the copy of Searchlight found under the seat – a pornographic magazine from the 1950s.
“It’s in the archives now,” says Wayne.
For Denis Rodda, the lure of this workshop was strong enough to bring him back from retirement.
Denis was one of the many casualties of the Bendigo Railway Workshops closure in the 1990s.
A car builder for 32 years, he took a redundancy at the age of 49.
“It was one way I could get out of the place,” he says.
“We lost a lot of young tradesmen then, it was pretty hard.”
Denis says he spent a bit of time at home as “Mr Mom”.
“I enjoyed being at home. I became a toy maker. I used to make wooden toys. I made locomotives for all the grandkids.”
In 2000 Denis saw an ad calling for volunteers with the Bendigo Trust.
“I went to the mine and they sent me down here and I’ve been here ever since,” he says.
“For the first two or three years I was a volunteer a couple of days a week and then they offered me a job.
“I’ve met a lot of good people and made a lot of good friends over the years.
“Every day I say I’m going to retire, get out, but the next day I’m back again.”
The rattle and hum of Bendigo trams was a constant soundtrack to Denis’ childhood. He grew up in Lily Street, and caught the tram to school every day.
He says after the St Kilian’s school bell rang at the end of each day, he and his mates would run to Pall Mall, and if they couldn’t see the tram coming, they’d race to catch it at the fountain, saving four pence on the ticket – just enough for an icy pole.
“And we knew all the trammies,” he says.
“I reckon they knew every family in every suburb – that was all part of life back then.”
Denis says he’d love to see a day where trams were reinstated as public transport in Bendigo.
“I’d do all I could to get it back. It’d be great for this place,” he says.
In the 12 years the workshops have been reopened, the Bendigo institution has built a worldwide reputation for its craftsmanship.
And as such, the work is flooding in.
The tramways celebrated the safe arrival of its first international export this year.
The two 1920s trams went of track for the big journey from the Bendigo workshops to Auckland’s Jellicoe Wharf.
When the tourist trams began last month it was the first time in 55 years that trams had graced the New Zealand city.
Anita Bagley, team leader tram services, says Auckland is already looking to expand its network.
“They had 7000 people ride the trams on the first day,” she says.
The star of the workshops right now doesn’t look like much, stripped back to the bare minimum, just a skeleton of its former self, but the tramways is holding high hopes for the W Class vintage tram in the throes of refurbishment.
The Melbourne City Circle tram is the first to be touched in an $8 million state government restoration program to maintain the W Class trams as part of Victoria’s culture.
This week the tramways welcomed the news that a second W Class tram was on its way to Bendigo.
Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Development Damian Drum said the restoration work was a massive boost for the Bendigo Trust and for the region.
“Over the years, the Trust has gained an international reputation for completing high-quality heritage tram restorations,” Mr Drum said.
“It has worked hard to develop the workforce, traditional skills and infrastructure to be the best in the field.
“In doing so, the Trust has built a tourism asset which is now a symbol of Bendigo.
“Every W Class tram Melbourne people ride on in years to come will have a little bit of Bendigo built in.”
Anita says with a $3 million-plus expansion of the workshops taking place, Bendigo was well placed to carry out the entire W Class program; fingers crossed.
For the tradesmen here, it’s a guarantee their highly specialised skills won’t be lost.
Once the workshop expansion is complete, there will be new apprentices brought on board to learn from these older guys.
And it seems despite the vintage technology, trams will never go out of vogue.
There’ll always be new people to fondly call themselves tram spotters, like eight-year old Finn, of Bendigo.
“Finn comes in with his dad every second Sunday and he’s been coming since he was four,” Anita says.
“It’s really lovely, his dad has even learnt to drive a tram so he can take his son.
“Finn’s got aspirations to be the boss and he comes and hangs out with us.”
And it seems it’s not only people who find a sense of belonging here beside the tram tracks off Hargreaves Street.
As we leave, Waldo, the grey and white tom cat, sashays by.
He lives a couple of doors down, but he chooses to spend all his waking time here.
Waldo knows he’s in good company.
Email a friend