This is the view across the street from our apartment building - Flinders Street Station, built in 1854. A mere twenty years before, the entire city of Melbourne did not exist – it was the hunting and gathering grounds of Aboriginals whom had resided in the area for approximately 40,000 years. As an aside to an aside, the earliest recorded history most of us learned about in school – the Mesopotamian Civilization - occurred only five thousand years ago. Back in a little more modern of times, the then small village of Melbourne was founded in 1835. Gold was discovered during 1851 in the region and the ensuing prosperity soon begat “Marvellous Melbourne”.
The main entrance of Flinders Street Station is down the block, on the left side of the photo. The traditionally photographed dome cannot be seen from this angle. This station is the main commuter train station for the Melbourne metropolitan area (3.7 million people), an estimated 110,000 commuters use the station on a weekday. Compare this to ~6 million people in the Philly area with only 25,000 using 30th Street Station.
In general, Aussies love their cars. Twenty million Aussies own 14.4 million cars, a slightly lower rate of 301 million Americans with 250 million cars, but still fairly high compared to the rest of the world. Nevertheless, this city has a great public transportation system, including the tram network, known to many Americans as trolleys. At the bottom of the photo is a tram stop with a tram entering the shadows on the right. Using the tram network, we can easily reach most of the inner suburbs, which are much like the neighborhoods in Philly (i.e., South Philly, Fairmount, Manayunk). There also is plenty to do within an easy walking distance of a few blocks of our new home – restaurants, shops, museums, pubs, theatres and much more.
A lot of facts, I know, but some may find it interesting.
The main entrance of Flinders Street Station is down the block, on the left side of the photo. The traditionally photographed dome cannot be seen from this angle. This station is the main commuter train station for the Melbourne metropolitan area (3.7 million people), an estimated 110,000 commuters use the station on a weekday. Compare this to ~6 million people in the Philly area with only 25,000 using 30th Street Station.
In general, Aussies love their cars. Twenty million Aussies own 14.4 million cars, a slightly lower rate of 301 million Americans with 250 million cars, but still fairly high compared to the rest of the world. Nevertheless, this city has a great public transportation system, including the tram network, known to many Americans as trolleys. At the bottom of the photo is a tram stop with a tram entering the shadows on the right. Using the tram network, we can easily reach most of the inner suburbs, which are much like the neighborhoods in Philly (i.e., South Philly, Fairmount, Manayunk). There also is plenty to do within an easy walking distance of a few blocks of our new home – restaurants, shops, museums, pubs, theatres and much more.
A lot of facts, I know, but some may find it interesting.
1 comment:
Please tell me you are using some type of reference material to write this entry so that I don't feel as bad about the things I don't know... :)
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