our heritage

Waiting for the late train at Flagstaff this afternoon (this time hilariously the trains were announced as being late due to 'rowdy behaviour at Flinders Street') I noticed that the map, scheme, diagram whatever you wanna call it of the western/northern suburbs trains had a little blacked-out bit from those grand and noble days when the Altona line was its own wild beast and the trains stopped there and went no further. As I recall, there was never a train between Altona and Werribee until probably the early 90s, but there was a railway reserve since cocky was an egg. I used to know someone who lived across from that railway reserve so I could have made further enquiries about that from a horse's mouth but we are incommunicado. You know, now they even have Westona station which is about as ludicrous a concept as Westmeadows, which isn't too far from where we are, and which used to be Broadmeadows proper except the railway station for Broadmeadows got built further east and that eventually became Broadmeadows. Westona I'm sure was never Altona, it's an interesting name and I guess when it comes down to it I don't mind the fact that there is a Westona, but it does kind of suggest that the 'Al' part of 'Altona' has some kind of extra meaning, like it means 'normal' or something. Yes. They should have Westona and Normaltona, or Usualtona, or Generaltona or something similar. I would support that.