Acland Street Village

🚋 St Kilda: a haven for gunzels!
Or how Sydney tried to insult us and gave us an iconic name.

Ever spotted someone on a St Kilda platform or traffic island frantically photographing an approaching tram?
There`s a word for them: gunzel.

Today, a gunzel is anyone seriously into public transport - trains, trams, buses, routes, timetables and rolling stock.
But the word began with Victorian tram enthusiasts!

Back in the late 50s into the early 1960s, Sydney was dismantling its tram network while Melbourne still had our extensive system.
Passionate Victorian tram enthusiasts travelled up north to photograph and document Sydney`s disappearing trams.

Sydney tram workers reportedly thought these visitors were a little TOO enthusiastic, chasing trams with cameras and notebooks
These tram workers apparently saw a quality in the Victorian tram fans - obsessive, reckless, and a little too keen to get their man... or, in this case, their tram..
So they mockingly nicknamed them “gunzels”, apparently adapting the American slang word “gunsel”( trigger happy hotheads ) popularised by The Maltese Falcon

The Sydney workers` dig didn`t stick. Victorian enthusiasts LOVED the name and adopted it!
It gradually spread to public transport fans of all kinds.
In 2025, “gunzel” was added to the Oxford English Dictionary`s Australian English entries.

St Kilda has plenty of gunzel material!

Cable trams first ran along Acland Street in the 1890s.
Electric trams arrived in 1925, the same year the electric tramway opened along Fitzroy Street.
We even had a Route 69 tram, and for a time Route 3 took a detour to enjoy the St Kilda sights.
Today, Routes 12, 16 and 96 still roll through the area.

So, local gunzels, can you identify the exact model of tram in the photo?

📸 Photo by AJ Wilko

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Avoid the Cardboard Jungle! 🏡
Moving house doesn`t have to mean living in an ocean of boxes!

Whether you`re relocating to St Kilda and still searching for your dream home, renovating your current place or dealing with the unexpected ie storm damage, Hybrid Real Estate has come up with a clever solution.

Their furnished rental service offers fully equipped apartments for short-term stays, so you can settle in without the hassle of moving all your belongings twice or trying to make an empty rental feel like home.

With flexible tenancies, you can stay for the time you need, on your own timeline.

Plus, Hybrid offers prompt, personal service and assistance from the day you move in to the day you move out.

Because a home should feel like home from the very first night. 🛋️

Find Hybrid Real Estate at 3/212 Barkly St, St Kilda.
Follow @hybrid.realestate to find out more.

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