A Photo Booth Is One Of Melbourne’s Hidden Landmarks

With the rise of the corporate photo booth hire emphasising that the technology is here to stay even in the age of the selfie, several public photo booths are more than useful tools for producing passport-quality photographs and have become historic landmarks in their own right.

This can sometimes be because of a connection to celebrity figures who used them such as the one in Grand Central Station or have endured as a means of youth expression such as the Japanese purikura machines.

However, one booth is so famous in its local area as an enduring mini-landmark that an attempt to remove it prompted a national backlash.

Flinders Street Station is the busiest railway station in Melbourne, Australia and home to the fourth longest railway platform in the world and is such an eclectic building that a longstanding myth was that it was designed for Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus but the two designs were swapped in the post.

For over sixty years, a three-minute analogue black and white photo booth has been in constant operation, owned and maintained by Alan Adler throughout.

That was, at least, until May of 2018, when upgrades to Flinders Street Station meant that the booth had to be removed, with Metro Trains Victoria giving the then-86-year-old man just ten days to get rid of it.

Mr Adler explained the situation to passers-by, which started a backlash that intensified against Metro Trains in support of Mr Adler and his culturally significant photo booth, which gained the support not only of people across Australia but also the Minister for Transport.

After just a few days, Metro Trains apologised and together they successfully relocated the booth so it could stay in Flinders Street Station, the entire saga of which became a national news story in Australia.

The booth continues to run to this day near the bus stop, highly popular with not only tourists but also people in the local area.