I thought on this blog i’d display a few of our recent tram designs that have been created for our customers. This is just a few chosen to give a good cross section of what our customers have been designing recently.

The Sydney steam tramway was supposed to operate for the six months’ duration of the exhibition only. However, it was so efficient and popular that an extension to Randwick was opened the following year. By 1894 the tramway network had increased to 65 km, the peak period of steam trams in Sydney. At this time there were over 100 steam-tram motors in service, carrying 60 million passengers per year.

The express commuter steam tram which sped in from Bondi each weekday morning reputedly at speeds of up to 80 km/h, gave rise to the famous Australian slang term ‘shoots through like a Bondi tram’. Intense competition from the privately owned horse buses saw the government trams racing buses along various routes. Gradually the trams forced the buses to the outer limits of the city in a pattern that steam would later follow as it was forced out by electric trams. Steam trams never became popular in the other state capitals, but were successfully used in Newcastle, Maitland and Broken Hill in NSW and Rockhampton in Queensland.

This article is courtesy of the great book ‘On the Move, a history of transport in Australia’, by Margaret Simpson’ and is brought to you by Tram Scrolls Australia, specialists in premium quality replica tram and bus scroll art.

Brought to you by blue horizon Printing, specialists in premium quality canvas art prints and offering Australia’s largest and best collection of tram and bus scrolls.

http://bluehorizonprints.com.au/ 1300 632 332

Ninth Avenue tram scroll

Ninth Av. New York Metro Roll. We have also just added 2 more Paris Bus and Tram Scrolls as our customers have requested a more ‘European font’ to be used, these Parisian rolls are copies of original bus rolls from the 1930′s and contain destinations such as Champs Elysee and the Louvre. Check out the range of scrolls here.

We are also very pleased to announce our Square Canvas print bus and Tram roll range. These canvas art prints are based on the original 1920′s-1960′sAustralian Bus Roll signs. They are available in large and Extra large, the image pictured is the large.

This Bus Roll canvas print range is limited to our biggest selling Tram Scroll designs. They are mounted

on a solid wooden kiln dried frame (kiln drying helps prevent the timber warping over time). The canvas print is then given a protective coat to help prevent fading and scratching, the finished work of art is delivered with pcture wire and is ready to hang immediately.

As with our Nostalgic tram scroll range we also offer a customisation service for these square bus roll prints, for just 420 we will create a personalised print, providing as many proofs as required until the customer is absolutely happy with the design, we will then print and despatch within 2 days!

dont forget as with all canvas art on the Blue Horizon Printing

website, we offer 100% FREE SHIPPING of any prints ANYWHERE in Australia!

Ninth Av. New York Metro Roll

We have also just added 2 more Paris Bus and Tram Scrolls as our customers have requested a more ‘European font’ to be used, these Parisian rolls are copies of original bus rolls from the 1930′s and contain destinations such as Champs Elysee and the Louvre.  Check out the range of scrolls here.

We are also very pleased to announce our Square Canvas print bus and Tram roll range. These canvas art prints are based on the original 1920′s-1960′s  Australian Bus Roll signs. They are available in large and Extra large, the image pictured is the large.

Brooklyn Bus Roll Square

This Bus Roll canvas print range is limited to our biggest selling Tram Scroll designs. Thet are mounted on a solid wooden kiln dried frame (kiln drying helps prevent the timber warping over time). The canvas print is then given a protective coat to help preventm fading and scratching, the finished work of art is delivered with pcture wire and is ready to hang immediately.

As with our Nostalgic tram scroll range we also offer a customisation service for these square bus roll prints, for just 420 we will create a personalised print, providing as many proofs as required until the customer is absolutely happy with the design, we will then print and despatch within 2 days!

dont forget as with all canvas art on the Blue Horizon Printing

website, we offer 100% FREE SHIPPING of any prints ANYWHERE in Australia!

http://bluehorizonprints.com.au/artshop_viewall.php?catid=28#top

Here are a few reasons why people keep on buying their destination art from Blue Horizon Printing:

• Best prices – our prices our the lowest by up to 40%!
• Best quality – we use museum quality, archival canvas and Epson UV resistant inks that have been tested to last up to 70 years without fading!
• Fast delivery – once you approve an order, your tram scroll is normally delivered within 4 days, ready to hang straight on the wall.
• FREE SHIPPING / FREE DESIGN / FREE CUSTOMISATION of tram scroll – thats right, we offer our customers the choice of free delivery or free design (they get to design their own tram and bus sign art). Depending on the delivery address, whichever is more expensive, delivery or customisation is totally free!
• Personal service – we pride ourselves on offering personal, professional service to help our customers choose the tram scroll that is best for them, whether its colour or size.
• Largest range of tram and bus scrolls in Australia – we offer a massive range of tram and bus banners with at least one for every major Australian city. We have more than 3 per city to choose from for brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne!

If you are looking for quality artwork for your walls then look no further, our canvas prints are designed and created with absolute care and attention to detail.

Here is a list of a few tram scrolls we offer:

Palm Beach,Bronte,Watsons Bay, Many to Narrabeen, City to Malabar, Pyrmont, The Spit, North Bondi, Cronulla, St Kilda, Fitzroy, Port Melbourne, Geelong, Glenelg, Sunshine Coast via Fraser island, London, Paris, Belfast, Ireland, Byron Bay, East Brisbane, Teneriffe Ferry, Garden City, Noosa Heads, Auckland.

Long after the line itself is a lost memory, the Bondi tram will retain a place in the Australian language. In some future age, maybe a space traveller will say to a companion: ËœWhats the new rocket ship like, is it fast? ËœTo which the other will doubtless reply: ËœFast? Ill say! It shoots through like Bondi tram…

Last of the Bondi trams

People may have forgotten the origin of the phrase and whether or not it started with steam or electrics is an argument rather irrelevant to this story. To find the beginnings theyll search dusty files for the story of Australias most famous tramway that began when Queen Victoria sat on the throne of England; when ËœTea Gardens was the name for Bondi Junction and Bondi Beach, an expanse of deserted surf and empty sand hills.

If they look far enough theyll find that there once was a steam tram that did Ëœshoot through reputedly at speeds of up to 50 mph (80km/h). Every weekday morning it sped from Bondi with its load of commuters bound for the city -a plume of steam drifting in the breeze, cars rolling like ships on an ocean swell, starch-collared businessmen solemnly consulting their watches and having a quiet wager as to whether or not they would beat the ocean street tram to Mark Foys corner. In the late afternoon the process was reversed.

Bondi tram travellers first glimpsed the ocean on May 24^th 1884 when anew track, branching from the established Waverley route at Bondi Junction opened as far as Denham street corner. An extension on 29^th August 1887 took it to the headland above Tamarama beach to serve the new Bondi Aquarium, which awed the crowd with a couple of vast man-eating sharks.

The zenith of the steam tram age was at hand when the line finally reached down the hill towards the pounding Pacific rollers. No pavilions, no milk bars, cafes or bottle shops; the trams terminated on a balloon loop with just a water tank for replenishing the boiler. Drivers warned to Ëœwatch out for sand drifts across the rails.

The service began on the 19^th of February 1894. A fourpenny fare (cheaper than the sixpence to Coogee Beach) bought a 35 minute ride covering the 5¾ miles (9km) from Bridge Street. But the would-be traveller needed to be on time, for at the start of the service,, one tram in the morning and one tram in the afternoon was the whole weekday schedule.

Last of the Bondi trams

Summer weekends were a different story. Thousands packed the steam trams to picnic, sniff the ozone, let children paddle in the ripples; but they certainly did not bathe, for only lawbreakers or crackpots entered the surf in daylight. Push-up motors stationed at Bondi beach boosted the three-car holiday trams over a 1-19 grade through the rock cutting to Denham street, while on the outward run another pusher might be needed to assist on Barracks Hill between Darlinghurst junction and the Ocean Street siding.

Historian Gil Hayman recalled the introduction of the ËœFishing specialËœtaking the fishermen by express trams to the old Bondi terminus, near the top of Bellview Street, Tamarama. The fish tram left the city at 10am. Fishermen would board with their gear and spend a day on the ricks with rod and line.

Steam was in its final golden era then. Express Ëœmailtrams were in operation to Bondi, Waverley Cemetery, Coogee beach, Botany, St Peters, Dulwich Hill, Abbotsford, Leichardt, Balmain and Glebe Point. The Bondi Expresses of up to four cars ran from the Aquarium to Upper Tamarama pausing at Bondi Junction, Paddington Post office for mail) then Ocean Street until reaching the city. They had first and second class accommodation and the road was kept clear by timetabling the all-stop trams to be refuged into loop sidings to let them pass. When the crowded holiday trams left Bondi Beach at dusk, they went belching fire as they chugged up the grade, giving watchers a foretaste of hell, a regular prelude to Dantes Inferno.

The steam trams helped to build Bondi into a densely populated suburb, and to encourage the culture of surf worshipping that has never ceased. In some ways one can blame the Bondi steam tram for the failure of the successive governments to build a long overdue Eastern Suburbs railways, for it was easy to argue that the trams that Ëœshot through whose speed and madcap progress earned a place in the lexicon of sayings that are essentially Australian, were more than adequate for the run to the beach.

This article is by Blue Horizon Printing, www.bluehorizonprinting.com.au , we offer a massive selection of replica tram and bus scrolls with a number of options for the Eastern suburbs and covering all major early tram routes.  For more selections also visit our sister company at www.tramscrolls.com.au .

1300 632 332 or photos@bluehorizonprinting.com.au .

Thanks to David Burke and his book ‘Juggernaut’, A story of Sydney in the wild days of the steam trams’.

All stops to...Garden City

We offer a really fast turnaround, usually a finished tram scroll print is despatched within 2 working days so that it is recieved within 3-4 days from the order being placed. If you really have left it too late and desperately need your premium quality Tram and Bus scroll the next day then we can usually accomodate this too.

Best of all… to help launch TRAM SCROLLS AUSTRALIA we are offering FREE SHIPPING on all scrolls, anywher in Australia!!

The tram and Bus scroll range includes destinations from all major Australian cities often with multiple options with different suburbs. Here ar just a few of the destinations we offer:

Sydney Destination scrolls:

Watsons Bay, The Gap, Vaucluse, Dover heights, Nth bondi, Bondi beach, Tamarama, Bronte, Clovelly via Randwick Racecourse, Coogee, Sth Coogee, Maroubra,

or

Pyrmont, Ultimo, Glebe, Annandale, Leichardt via Lillyfield, Rozelle, Balmain via White Bay Port, Balmain East, Birchgrove, Drummoyne, Five Dock

Sydney North Shore Destination scrolls:

The Spit via Beauty Point, Balmoral, Bathers Pavillion via Nth Head, Mosman, Chowder Bay, Clifton Gardens, Taronga Zoo, Cremorne, Neutral Bay, Kirribilli, Milsons Point

Tram destination scroll on wall

or

Palm Beach, Whale beach, Nth Avalon, Avalon via Claremont, Bilgola Bends via newport Arms, Bungan Head, Mona Vale, Warriewood, Turimetta Head, Nth Narrabeen

Brisbane Destination scrolls:

Teneriffe Ferry, New Farm, Fortitude Valley, Spring Hill, Kangeroo Point, The Gabba, West End VIA Paddington, Rosalie, Auchenflower, Dutton Park, Toowong, Indooroopilly

or

Garden City, Mt Gravatt Central, Wishart, Mansfield, Mt Gravatt East, Holland Park, Greenslopes VIA Buranda, Woolloongabba, Mater Hill, South Bank, Cultural Centre, Brisbane City

Melbourne Destination scrolls:

Fitzroy Smith & Johnston sts, Clifton Hill, Nth fitzroy, Barkly St, Brunswick st, City, Vinctoria Parade, City Elizabeth St, Flinders St, Football, Jolimont, Richmond, Racecourse, Showgrounds

Port Melbourne, Albert Park via Middle Park, Sth Melbourne, Southbank, Royal Botanic Gardens, Sth Yarra, Toorak, Armadale via Malvern, Kooyong, Hawthorn, Camberwell

Geelong, Torquay via Great Ocean Road, Jan Juc, Bells Beach, Anglesea, Lorne, Apollo Bay via Cape Otway, The Twelve Apostles, Port Campbell, Warrnabool, Port Fairy

Perth Destination scrolls:

Freemantle, Nth Freemantle, Mosman Park, Peppermint grove, Cottesloe, Claremont, Dalkeith via Subiaco via Leederville, City Beach, Scarborough, Trigg, North Beach

Adelaide Destination scrolls:

Glenelg via Showgrounds, Hyde Park, Kingswood, Mitcham, Springfield, Glen Osmond, Burnside, Kensington Gardens, Morialta, St Peters, Walkerville Nth, Prospect

If however you cant find the suburb you want or you want to create a unique, personalised scroll with details such as the countries or cities you’ve visited, details of your life or even your favourite bands then we only charge $30 for you to customise your own tram and bus banner / scroll. This is half the price of other companies.

Unlike some companies printing similar products, Tram scrolls Australia focuses on keeping the Tram routes as close to the original ones in the 1950′s as possible, the destinations are carefully researched and cross referenced as we are proud of Australia’s cultural history.

Blue Horizon Printing and now Tram Scrolls Australia are THE NUMBER ONE STOPS for your tram and Bus banner scrolls if you are looking for premium quality at unbeatable prices.

call us on 1300 632 332 or email on info@tramscrolls.com.au / photos@bluehorizonprinting.com.au

http://www.tramscrolls.com.au

http://bluehorizonprints.com.au/artshop_viewall.php?catid=28#top

Our tram scrolls have been extreemly popular and we are one of Australia’s foremost suppliers of premium quality Tram banner Art.

Unlike other canvas print suppliers we are very flexible with our customers, our range consists of 3 styles of prints (soon to be 4) and we offer 3 classic original colour schemes.

Our tram scroll prints are cheap compared to other providers BUT the quality of our prints is second to none! They are great quality as you will see from reading our feedback below.

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Looks like not everyone was so keen on Sydneys Trams when they first came to town…. This is a genuine poem from the Sydney Punch in 1882, a popular paper at the time.

Melbourne Tram scroll

Bondi Tram Scroll / Destination banner

Sydney Tram scroll

That horrible tram

(A Route Residents Refrain)

Oh the tram! The horrible tram!

Butting its way like a bellicose ram!

Floundering through our narrow streets,

Frighting the wits out of all it meets,

Smashing a youngster here and there,

Shaving skulls by breath of a hair!

Snorting wheezing, groaning along,

Its cracked bell tinkling a dismal song;

For all our comfort and safety to damn,

Theres nothing can beat that horrible tram!

Oh the tram! The horrible tram!

With its clash and clatter; crush and cram!

Puffing along at a snail-like pace,

Or running a-muck a frantic race!

Jibbling praps here, and leaving rails there,

Filling the town with a frenzied scare,

Maiming its victims, day after day,

Through Human bodies hewing its way!

Who could contrive a more devilish sham

Than we have in our horrible juggernaut tram?

Once we had streets that were open and free,

No hideous trams filled them, out on the spree;

Once we could cheerily walk out or drive,

With some faint hope of returning home alive!

No visions of limbs all bloody and torn,

Haunted our senses from night until morn:

But comfort, peace, safety, happiness, all,

Are done to death Ëœneath the tram fiends pall!

Hades itself could scarce more our lives dawn,
Than this horrible, bloodthirsty, Juggernaut tram!

Sydney Punch, 23^rd September 1882

Courtesy of Blue Horizon Printing, your first stop for Tram scrolls, Bus banners, Destination Art and Bus art.

All stops to Geelong...Beige Bus Banner

All this changed when the steam trains came to Sydney.

Within the space of a few years, the city became the steam tram capital of the world. Only Paris could boast a system to match Sydneys. Steam trams went on to dominate the streets of Sydney for the next 20 years until their gradual decline from the end of the last century.

Many people say that the ËœAmericanisationof Sydney began with the introduction of the trams when a 24 year old Philadelphia boy introduced the first imports into Lane Cove. The trams were to become a source of a great deal of Sydneys cultural identity in the early days, the phrase that went onto become a national lexicon Ëœshooting through like a Bondi tram was often used to reference anything that was fast paced at the time.  Many also believe the trams were responsible for the famous Ëœwolf whistlewhen the drivers sounded their horns at the sighting of an attractive girl.

Citizens were alternately captivated and terrorised by the steam trams. They were known as the ˜manglersand ˜ Juggernauts. Cartoonists frequently depicted them with an angel of death at the throttle, or with the visage of a flesh eating demon! Pedestrians and horse traffic were their victims; newspapers seemed to relish gory descriptions of the latest set of accidents.

The first batch of steam trains reached Sydney from the famous Baldwin locomotive works in 1879. The government had purchased them as an urgent but temporary measure to carry patrons from the inconvenient Redfern railways terminus to the International Exhibition in the Botanic Gardens.

The Exhibition came and went but the Sydney trams stayed. Citizens had become so enamoured by this new, swift and convenient mode of street transportation that they wouldnt let go of them.

So the lines reached out to Bondi, Balmain and Botany, to Leichardt and La Perouse, to Abbotsford, Coogee, Marrickville, Newtown and Woolahra. At the peak, more than 100 steam Ëœmotors(as the engines were know) were in service, weaving around them a unique folklore of friendly drivers, larrikin conductors, accusations of scandals, frauds and misbehaviour, and the machinations of sly politicians and land-shark developers of a wild past country.

Down narrow streets came the snorting little monsters with whistles shrilling, alarm bells ringing, steam hissing from beneath the wheels, stampeding the horses and scattering the pedestrians. Behind them they tugged, double deck, ungainly open coaches, where women on the upper level could call the conductor to supply them with a modesty lace to tie down their skirts.

The steam trams contributed a little known episode to the history of early Sydney however through the efforts of Blue Horizon Printing, we are seeing some of this history refreshed. Blue Horizon recently launched a unique range of tram scroll destination art. These bus and tram banners are replicas of the old 1950s and 1960s bus signs that used to adorn most Bus and Tram stations across Australia. Destination blinds Brisbane, Tram scrolls Sydney, Bus banners Melbourne, Travel art Adelaide.

This is a blog of Blue Horizon Printing, premium providers of the best quality, best priced tram and Bus scrolls. Canvas prints delivered ready to hang straight on the wall.