Just three Melbourne unis still have a dedicated campus bar. But will 2024 finally bring campuses back to life after COVID?
found just three Melbourne universities still have a dedicated campus bar.La Trobe’s beloved Eagle bar was turned into a corporate function centre during COVID, but the university says it’s considering a new bar.It’s Thursday – student night – and a new generation is streaming through universities for orientation week festivities. First-years clutch flyers for student clubs in motorsports and, queue for “speed-friending” events, or squint into their phones as they download the campus map app.
From the university library across the road, you could see the crowd at the Corkman. “And from the Corkman you could see everyone still studying.” Planning ministers and the city council soon joined the students’ court battle to bring it back and block the developers’ plans to build apartments and, late last year, they won – a court ordered thatFormer law students Duncan Wallace and Tim Staindl at the site of the Melbourne law school favourite, the Corkman Irish pub, which was illegally knocked down in 2016.
RMIT’s Oxford Scholar is one of the few university bars still alive in Melbourne, rebuilt after the original Gold Rush-era pubwas playing out the back on a big TV where students could cast their phones, and burgers were cheap. But some were at RMIT’s dedicated computer gaming lounge nearby. Sir John’s at Monash in Clayton is also hanging on, though not all students seem impressed. “Is this the pub or like, a cafeteria?” asked one whenRMIT first-years Alisha Ali, Marianna Mossonidis and Vanessa Jacob enjoying their time at the O-week “street party”.