second oldest roller coaster in the
world is this the great Scenic Railway
at Luna Park in Melbourne Australia it
was built in 1912 and it's one of very
few roller coasters in the world where
the brakes are still operated manually
we're a brake operator like Freya there
rides Along on every road timing
everything and making sure that the
Riders go over the hills at exactly the
right speed every time so obviously I
had some questions for Freya and the
team here about how it all works but I
thought I might want to wait until
freyja was a little bit less busy
I have been driving for about five or
six years now
um which is a lot of fun um sending
people around on a roller coaster it's
pretty unusual job we usually try and
keep people on only for like an hour at
a time
um because it can get very tiring
obviously it's all manual labor slowing
it down we do about 24 hours worth of
training which includes doing a walk of
the track Theory as well as a lot and a
lot and a lot of driving same as driving
a car trying to expose them to as many
different conditions as possible I did
not expect to get actual air time for
110 year old roller coaster wow that's
not a bad view from up here either
it is so dependent on the conditions
that you're driving on there's no this
is exactly how you drive the train every
time everyone has their own little ways
of doing it we obviously don't just
throw someone behind the break and say
go for it because standing up an oven
roller coaster is a weird thing to do
once they're all comfortable standing up
we'll move them behind the brake and as
a trainer you will tell them when to
apply and not apply a break and from
then on it's just doing a lot of lapse
to get experience in different
conditions every cycle you run is
different you've got to be able to make
those judgment calls if it is too windy
depending on the direction it's coming
from it will stop the train so we keep
an eye out on like the wind radar and
things like that to keep a ball path as
well as our drivers have a pretty good
idea of how that's impacting the train
rain we also don't run in makes the
train go way too fast and it becomes
difficult to actually slow it down if it
does come to a stop if it's too windy or
something like that we'd get a team of
people to come up they walk up the track
which are all trained how to do and then
give it a big push start to get it going
which is always a bit of fun and
entertainment for all of the guests on
board
sure this is more than a hundred years
old but it needs to perform to 21st
century safety standards and get 21st
century inspections so how does it do
that where we run into modern safety
rules we have to negotiate with the
Heritage Council and say this is the
most sensitive way we can possibly
achieve the result it's a difficult
balance again it's a very very expensive
one to maintain
continuous maintenance and by no means
This Is It Off the Shelf it's it's
already in hundreds equipment we have to
replace like for like wherever possible
that means we have to have them
manufactured especially it's a
never-ending job
so we only run two trains on the track
the first train that is dispatched is
required to get halfway around the track
before we dispatch the next one
now there are four blocks defined on the
track by lights the two opportunities on
every circuit to pull the terrain up
that was done nigh on 20 years ago
modern legislation we had to conceive of
everything that could possibly go wrong
the longer you leave risk the more
chance is kind of occurring
and there have been discussions who
modernize that control system so the
brakes on the train could be invoked
externally all of these things are on
the list and will eventually have to
happen no question
thank you very much