PUBLIC TRANSPORT VICTORIA TEACHES US HOW TO CATCH TRAMS

These two posters at our tram stop shelter are most revealing - not on how to be in your 90s and safely catch one of the new trams and get a seat, and hang on to the straps, and stand firmly.

This is what the TRAM COACH tells us inside the shelter:

TRAM SAFETY: LET'S ALL GET ON BOARD

Next to TRAM COACH are three items in circles and they read, from left to right:

sit tight; grip right; stand strong.

Now let's take them in sequence, based on the fact that you are 95 years of age: sit tight assumes you have a seat to sit on - doesn't always happen on a full tram, and the picture is very unclear; then grip right assumes there are enough straps to hold on to - which there aren't on the new trams shown in the picture - and if you do manage to get a strap to grip onto - and it is too high anyway, and the tram jerks - which happens more often than not, so you can't grip right, what do you do when you fall?; then stand strong assumes you have somewhere level enough on these new trams to stand firmly, but again a jerk and you are flat on your face.

This really presents a major problem, and then try to get on and off these new trams and the platform is higher off the ground than the old trams, and you are old and arthritic and have all sorts of other age-related problems, and no car, and your main means of transport  - to your doctor and other people who help you one way and another is the tram, and taxis are expensive and you are a pensioner - and you have several problems!

And let's not forget how many tram stops - and we are only talking about tram stops at the moment - don't have seating while you wait for your tram, and you have several more problems.

This is what the TRAM COACH tells us outside the shelter:

TOUCHING ON: HAVE YOUR MYKI READY AND HOLD STEADY

Try and hold steady while you try and touch on and the tram jerks off  and your hold position is fairly tenuous at best!

What out coach does NOT tell us is that when you get off the tram, apart from falling off because there is such a huge gap between the inside platform and the ground outside,  you must look out very carefully because cars keep roaring through, even though legally they have to stop when the tram stops.

There is absolutely no reason why the government can't fit cameras or cctv to each tram to capture the motorists who are attempting to kill the alighting passengers, and fine them so heavily that they will not make these attempts in the future. They could be allocated demerit points as well so that their licences could be revoked if they exceeded a certain limit.