Thanks David,
Here's the diagram from the Victorian Railways website.
I notice that there were catch points in both tram lines.
Mal Rowe - still wondering what each lever did.
On 28/04/2025 14:18, espee8800 wrote:
As one who signal maintenance section actually covered Kooyong (and also Gardiner) all of the signalling equipment is railway.
The railway preceded the trams by some years although both Kooyong and Gardiner signal boxes were provided when the trams appeared - Kooyong 30/5/1913 and Gardiner 5/12/1917. Electric trains came to the Darling line on 15/12/1922 and that's when the switching gear for the overhead was installed.
At the time the only style of signal for these moves - effectively a shunt move across the railway - was the disc signals. In later years most were replaced by lights. These signals keep trams clear of the tramway square when the power is set for a train, the switching from 1500v to 600v is done by the catch point levers which also work the discs. Trams don't take kindly to 1500v DC. Trains would care about the 600 odd V though.
Elsternwick signal box opened on 1/11/1883 and the trams arrived 12/11/1913, the permanent signal box was replaced by a temporary building on 30/8/1959 for the grade separation and it was abolished on 2/10/1960.
