This clip shows an extraordinarily large crowd leaving the Randwick Racecourse and miraculously piling into dozens of waiting trams without a single person being crushed.

It is astounding to see such a dense and seemingly endless stream of people moved so efficiently. An intertitle at the opening of this segment indicates that the trams transported over 1,000 people per minute away from the racecourse. The multi-door design allowed for passengers to alight and disembark quickly and easily.

This documentary material was probably filmed by Cinesound, possibly as a promotion for Sydney’s extensive tramway system. It presents mostly as actuality footage (although it does contain intertitles) and offers a vivid portrait of a growing and bustling city at a time when Sydney’s population had just passed one million.