But Mr Weimar said about one third of the city's trams were fitted with CCTV.

"Every new tram we bring onto the network – and we're adding about one new tram a month – is equipped with around 10 cameras on it, inside and outside the tram, so the coverage is growing," he said.

Police have also collected CCTV footage from The Comics Lounge in North Melbourne, where Ms Maasarwe spent her final evening, and will trawl through the footage in a bid to spot her killer.

Her body was found by passers-by just after dawn on Wednesday, behind a hedge near the entrance to Polaris shopping centre.

Police have appealed for public help to find her killer, saying Ms Maasarwe was the innocent victim of a "horrendous, horrific attack".

The 21-year-old La Trobe University student was killed within 100 metres of a tram stop in the early hours of Wednesday morning.

She was a little more than a kilometre from home when she was attacked.

When asked whether PTV would consider boosting patrols of Protective Services Officers to include trams in the wake of the attack, Mr Weimar replied, "absolutely."

"We continue to work very closely with the transit division of the police around particular areas of concerns, around hotspots, any areas where we'd like to see some PSO coverage," Mr Weimer told 3AW.

He said PSOs had boarded trams near the Australian Open this week, and PTV was considering rolling this safety measure out across the network.

Mr Weimar also urged anyone who felt unsafe on a tram to speak to the tram driver, or to press the emergency button.

He said every tram, regardless of how old it was, had a driver with a direct radio connection to a control centre and to police.

"If anyone at any time doesn't feel comfortable on a tram or a bus, then please speak to a driver... use the emergency button or information on the tram," he said.

Mr Weimer said the Route 86 tram was one of the safest, busiest, longest and popular routes across the city, often filled with students travelling to La Trobe University.

"It's run almost exclusively with our modern trams, fitted with CCTV," he said.

"These are very, very rare incidents. Although it certainly doesn't feel like that when something horrific like this happens in the middle of our community."

Ms Maasarwe had been studying Chinese and English at Shanghai University, and had spent the past six months in Melbourne on a study abroad program at La Trobe University.

She was originally from Baqa al-Gharbiyye, a predominantly Arab city in the Haifa district in northern Israel, but had been living with one of her sisters in China, while studying there, before coming to Melbourne.

Her uncle, Rame Maasarwe, who lives in America, said his niece was an adventurous young woman who loved to travel.

"She’s positive, she likes to have fun, she’s a very friendly person you know. She’s a good sister," he said on Thursday. "I was very proud of her, she was a very good person, a very loving person.

"She liked to discover new things, see new places. She travelled all over the world."

He said his nephews had called him from Israel to tell him what had happened.

"I can’t believe that something like this has happened in Australia. It’s not safe there in Australia? In Melbourne? It’s not safe?" he asked. "We think America is dangerous, not Australia."

Dozens of locals visited the crime scene on Thursday to lay flowers and remember the young student who in recent weeks had posted shots of her first sunrise of 2019, as well as Australian waterfalls and bushland.

Her family, who arrived in Melbourne on Thursday morning, will now begin the heartbreaking process of taking her body home to Israel for burial.

With Simone Fox Koob