DESCRIPTIVE SKETCH OF NEW SOUTH WALES   

Atlas Page 16
By Andrew Garran,
Francis Meyers and F. J. Broomfield

SYDNEY - THE CITY & SUBURBS PART 2...

The valley of Woolloomooloo itself is the least pleasing part of the prospect, for it is a poor quarter, though not one of the poorest. The main streets are laid out straight, and of a fair width, but subdivisions, carried out by private individuals before the present stringent law regulated such matters, have multiplied narrow streets and lanes in which rows of squalid tenements are huddled together. On the elevated ridge of Darlinghurst the houses are generally of a superior class, and the principal street on the summit, leading to Potts’ Point, contains many handsome detached residences and several terraces of fair-sized houses. To the south, Victoria Street leads past St. John’s Church to the Gaol. Over the ridge the road makes a steep descent into the valley of Rushcutter’s’ Bay. This is the main South Head Road, and one of the favourite drives out of the city, leading as it does past the suburbs of Darling Point, Double Bay and Rose Bay. The Old South Head Road runs on the ridge, in conformity with the primitive colonial practice —to keep clear of the necessity for bridges being the great aim of the early road engineers. It was the task of a later day to face such constructive works and open out improved routes.

081 Pitt Street

This old road follows the line of the divide between the watershed of Port Jackson and that of Botany Bay; the topography of the eastern suburbs is understood at once when this line is traced with its lateral spurs running northward and terminating as promontories in the harbour. The western end of this divide —on the western point of which stands the Town Hall —is really the city ridge already referred to that separated the head of the Tank Stream from the creek flowing into Darling Harbour. This ridge following the line of Bathurst Street, and crossing the southern end of Hyde Park diagonally, continues up Oxford Street to the Gaol, through Paddington to Waverley, at which point it trends south, dividing the water falling into the ocean from that running towards the water reserve, and passing through Upper Randwick, continues to the North Head of Botany. This is the backbone of all the land to the eastern side of Sydney.

On its southern slope lies that sandy space which for many years has furnished the water supply of the metropolis, and which is one of the most remarkable city reservoirs in the world. It is really a great slope formed by the action of the southerly wind, during unnumbered ages, blowing up the sand against the face of the southern ridge. The rain-water that falls upon this sandy area, slowly percolates through it, and finally oozes out into the bed of a creek which the water has formed for itself. The sand acts like an immense sponge, from which the water drains out slowly. The first attempt to supply the city from this source was made at the instance of Mr. Busby, who found, near the head of the creek, a lagoon known by the name of Lachlan’s Swamp, the elevation of which was above that of Hyde Park. He persuaded the Government to let him make a tunnel under the ridge from the swamp to the park, a work which, owing to the indolence and incompetence of the convict workmen, he carried out with very great difficulty; but it answered its purpose, and was an immense boon to the citizens of that day, who had become severely pressed for want of water, the Tank Stream having proved wholly insufficient, and also getting very much polluted by the increasing population on its banks. Busby’s Bore, as this tunnel was called, has, with occasional repairs, lasted to this day, and still partially supplies the lower levels of the city by gravitation. Its utility was so great that a closer examination of the whole sandy swamp was made, and, when an additional supply was required, a pumping-engine was erected at the mouth of the creek where the water runs into Botany Bay, a line of pipes six miles in length being laid to a brick reservoir constructed in Crown Street, Surry Hills. All the wool-washing establishments were removed from the line of the creek, and a puddle-wall built across the outlet. Subsequently broad sand dams, with wooden by-washes, were built down its course, partly to store the water, and still more to hold it back so as to keep the land saturated as much as possible. This sand-basin thus treated has never been absolutely dry. Several times the citizens have been put on short allowance till rain fell and replenished the reservoirs, but there has always been enough for the absolute necessities of the population. The water, too, is of good quality, being rain-water filtered through sand, and the advantage of its being thus stored, instead of in an open reservoir, is that it is less subject to evaporation; nor is it exposed to any contaminating influence. But the fact that the water is hidden has been a constant puzzle to visitors. When asking to be shown the city water supply, and on being pointed to a small, feebly running creek and a shallow engine-pond, they have derisively ejaculated, "Why, there is not a week’s supply." And it is quite true that very often there is not so much as a week’s supply visible on the surface; but it continually oozes out, and in very dry seasons the percolation has been assisted by cutting ditches into the hills. The Botany supply is unequal to the wants of the present population, and the water from the Nepean is now the principal reliance of the city; but the Botany sand-slope served the purposes of Sydney for about half a century. Its peculiar character and value were not at first understood, and it was condemned as insufficient for very many years before it really proved so. It was only by slow degrees that its extraordinary capability duly appreciated; it is still one of the curiosities of the town, and a study for hydraulic engineers.

The new system for supplying the city is on a larger scale, and follows the customary lines. The water is intercepted at a distance of sixty miles from Sydney in deep gorges in sandstone country; the channels are dammed, and the water is then diverted through two long tunnels to a point from which it can be conveyed in an open cutting by a steadily descending gradient to a large reservoir constructed at Prospect, about four miles to the south-west of Parramatta. No large quantity can be stored at the sources, because the character of the country does not admit of the formation of any capacious basin, and therefore the water has to be collected at the most suitable place that can be found on the line of route. From the Prospect reservoir it is conveyed in an open cutting to a point about ten miles from Sydney, and for the remainder of the distance in pipes, through which it is delivered by gravitation into a large brick tank at Surry Hills.

082 Bridge Street

For the supply of the more elevated suburbs, water is pumped into a second at Paddington, and into another at a still greater elevation at Waverley. The cost of this scheme by the time it is finally completed will be about two millions sterling.

The backbone ridge, which we have already described as running eastward from Sydney, is the principal high road to the suburbs in that direction, and marks also the general course of the great underground sewer, the Cloaca Maxima, constructed to carry the Sydney slops to the sea. The early sewerage of the city, like its early streets, naturally, followed the contour of the country, and the drains were all emptied into the harbour. The engineers thought Port Jackson large enough to swallow any amount of sewage and show itself none the worse; but this has proved a great mistake. The water near the outfalls has been made filthy, and the foreshores in the neighbourhood have become foul with putrescent slime. After much study and consultation it was resolved to construct a main sewer to the ocean, and the outfall was fixed at Ben Buckler, a rocky projection north of Bondi beach. This conduit will drain all but a zone of land forming the coast belt, which has to be dealt with separately. When the great sewer is completely at work it is hoped that the waters of the harbour will regain something of their primitive purity. A considerable area on the southern side of Sydney cannot be drained by the Cloaca Maxima, and for this district a separate outfall has been made discharging on a sandy tongue of land on the shore of Botany Bay —a large portion of the southern side of Surry Hills being thus drained. These Surry Hills form a sort of plateau spreading out on the southern side of the main ridge. Shea’s Creek, corresponding in its character to the creek on the water reserve, and really forming part of the same general sandy basin, runs into the mouth of Cook’s River, and is the natural drainage channel for this part of Sydney. Had the creek been reserved early enough, it would have increased the area of the water catchment for the city supply, but it was hopelessly befouled by wool-washing establishments. The supply of fresh water obtainable from the sand has caused many manufacturing establishments to settle along the line of road. Some of the ground is too swampy for anything but market gardens, and the Chinese cultivators fully appreciate the value of the water. The shortest road to Botany Bay, now also supplied with a tramway, runs over this gently sloping and nearly level land to the south of Sydney. The general character of the ground on the north and south of the eastern ridge is very different. On the northern side are bold spurs with deep valleys between them; on the southern is the sandy slope falling into flat ground towards Botany Bay. The southern side is not much occupied, because so large a portion is reserved for the water supply, the racecourse and Moore Park. It is principally along the Waterloo Estate that population has settled, but some of the ground is low and difficult to drain, and it is to be regretted that it was not included in the earliest reserves. The shore is the northern coast of Botany Bay, which, though low and flat, is a favourite holiday resort.

083 Gate Lodge, Government House

Standing on the western edge of the Surry Hills plateau, the spectator looks down upon Redfern and the railway station. The site for what is now the centre of a very busy traffic was originally selected simply because there happened to be a vacant piece of ground there called the Cleveland Paddocks, and economy rather than convenience was the first consideration. The railway station was almost out of town when first built, but the suburbs have now so thickened round it that it is almost central to the’ population. The line of the first engineer was soon criticised by his successor, who pointed out that in a seaport the railway should be brought into close connection with the wharves; a branch line was therefore made from the station-yard down to the Pyrmont side of Darling Harbour. But the purpose of this line has remained largely undeveloped, the traffic between the station and the ships having been conducted by drays. Most of the incoming goods go straight to the wholesale warehouses, where they are unpacked and sorted and then re-packed for country delivery. A comparatively small portion of what is landed on the wharves goes in unbroken parcels to the country. So too with the produce coming down from the interior. Most of it has to be classified, examined and exposed for sale in Sydney, and only a portion is destined to go straight from the railway to the ship’s hold. As therefore the greater part of the commerce of the port in and out is filtered through the city, and a breaking of bulk has to take place, the fact that there is a gap between the railway station and the waterside has not been so great an inconvenience. But the need of close connection is becoming more and more felt, and the Government, with the view of making there an extensive railway wharf, and erecting warehouses for stores and produce, has resumed a large area of land on the Pyrmont side of Darling Harbour. In building in this locality, the Government has been anticipated by the Messrs. Goldsbrough and Co., who have already erected a large and massive stone store, the long imposing front of which is the most conspicuous feature in the landscape when Pyrmont is viewed from the Sydney side, and into which wool can be delivered direct from the railway trucks. As far as the passenger traffic is concerned, the position of the railway station, just beyond the point where Pitt and George Streets converge, is not inconvenient for travellers from the country, who, encumbered by luggage, take cabs to their hotels, or to any suburb to which they may be bound. But the suburban traffic has increased, and the inconvenience of the railway terminating a mile short of the business centre has been more and more complained of.

083 Macquarie Street

Many years ago a tramway worked by horse-power, which proved a great convenience, was laid down in Pitt Street by Mr. G. F. Train. The tram service, however, being a great interruption to the ordinary traffic of a street so narrow and so busy, and the complaints being so loud and general, the Government was forced to take up the line, and daily travellers had once more to have recourse to omnibuses until the revival of the tramway experiment in 1879, to meet the needs of the International Exhibition. Since then the tramway has acted as the last link of the railway service. But even this does not satisfy the demands of the rapidly-increasing number of suburban travellers, and an extension of the railway itself into the city has recently been proposed, and is now under consideration.

The suburban business did not at all enter into the plans of the early projectors of the railway, who were thinking only of opening up the interior and bringing down the produce of the country —indeed, for some years after the railway had been at work there was but little addition to the number of residents along the line. The localities served by the harbour steamboats, and those accessible by a short omnibus ride were the favourite places of residence. But, owing to the increase of population, and to the desire of many people to get away from the relaxing influence of the sea air, the railway was more and more used by those whose business took them daily to the city. During the last ten years the development of the suburban traffic has been unexpectedly great. Stations have been multiplied, and now all the way from Sydney to Parramatta there is one continuous series of townships, the population as far as Homebush being thickly settled. The country passed through by this line is for the most part gently undulating, but with no great variety of scenery. The most elevated ground along the route lies pretty close to the city, the country beyond Petersham falling gradually to the west. In laying out the railway suburbs, no general plan has been followed; every proprietor subdividing his land according to his own fancy or interest. The separate municipalities have accordingly had to deal with the problems of streets and sewerage as best they could, and have found the task rather difficult. When each house stood in its own ground, sanitary questions did not arise; but the increase in the value of land, causing subdivision into small allotments, has so altered this state of things that, owing to imperfect drainage, the death-rate is now greater outside the city than within its boundaries. The older western suburbs lie along the road to Parramatta, and these have now grown greatly in consequence of their being served by tramways —such as Glebe, Forest Lodge, Camperdown, Leichhardt, and Annandale.

084 From Woolloomooloo to DarlinghurstAt a point beyond Homebush, about eight miles from the city, the Corporation has constructed large cattle-yards, where sales of cattle and sheep are held, most of the live stock being now brought into Sydney by railway. The abattoirs are at Glebe Island, on the eastern shore of the Balmain peninsula, five miles distant from the yards. This is admitted to be an unsatisfactory arrangement, and the Government —with a view to encourage the killing of cattle in the country, so as to save the animals the long and deteriorating journey, and bring the meat into the city in better condition —has erected large meat sheds provided with refrigerating rooms at a railway siding at Pyrmont. Should this system be largely developed, the importance of the city sale-yards will be greatly diminished. Farther along the railway line is situated the great city cemetery at Rookwood, and between this and Parramatta are several manufacturing establishments — the largest of which is that of the Messrs. Hudson Brothers, who migrated from town to get the advantage of space.

In addition to the original railway from Sydney to Parramatta, two other lines have lately been constructed, and these are creating new suburban districts. The first is the south-coast line, which, crossing the George’s River, climbs the high land beyond, and runs through somewhat rugged and picturesque country to Wollongong. At Waterfall Station, twenty miles from Sydney, this line reaches an elevation of seven hundred and twenty feet. The other railway, which acts as a suburban outlet, is the line connecting Sydney with Newcastle. It turns off to the north, eight miles from Sydney, and, crossing the Parramatta River, climbs the slopes on the northern side through the pretty village of Ryde, working up on to the ridge, along which it continues till it descends to the Hawkesbury River at Peat’s Ferry. At Hornsby, twenty-one miles from Sydney, this line attains the height of five hundred and ninety-two feet. Both these new railways give the benefit of elevation within a few miles of the city, accompanied by a drier and more bracing air. A great variety of climate is thus obtainable within a short radius, and, as tastes and constitutions vary, this is no small advantage.

All the railways converge into the Redfern Station, the area of which is becoming too small to accommodate the traffic. In order partially to relieve it, the Government purchased, a mile from the city terminus, a large estate at Eveleigh, where extensive workshops and engine-sheds have been erected, and where all the railway stores are kept. Thus, for a mile or two out of Sydney the line runs almost continuously through a railway yard.

In common with all the other colonial capitals, Sydney is the seat of the central government. The people in this respect have followed the example of the mother country rather than that of America, and the metropolis is the centre of politic, as well as of commerce. This was inevitable in early days, when the means of communication were very poor, and hitherto there has been no disposition to alter the established practice. The Governor’s residence, the seat of Parliament and the centre of administrative action are therefore in the metropolis, and though this arrangement has its conveniences, it tends to give the city preponderant influence, for nearly one-third of the population is gathered in the metropolitan county. New South Wales would be better balanced if it had more large local centres; but this can only arise out of a greater development of natural resources.

The local administration is in the hands of a council of aldermen, who elect the mayor. Half a century ago the citizens became dissatisfied with the ordinary municipal system, which was therefore exchanged for a paid commission; but after a short experience of this arrangement, they returned to the old-fashioned custom, and have adhered to it ever since. The gross city revenue from all sources is nearly four hundred thousand pounds annually, including an endowment from the Government; the yearly value of the city property is over two millions sterling. The population within the city limits is about one hundred and twenty-five thousand; that of the immediate suburbs is larger, the total population of the whole metropolitan area being close upon three hundred thousand. Each separate suburb has its own municipal system, but the want of union is increasingly felt, especially in connection with sanitary arrangements. The new sewerage and waterworks systems will remain in the hands of the Government till their completion, but it is in contemplation to appoint a metropolitan board of works to deal with all matters that are common to the city and suburbs.

The narrowness of the streets and the concentration of traffic on them has made their maintenance a difficult task. The ordinary macadam wears out very fast, and several varieties of asphalt roadway have been tried, though without success in the principal streets, where even bluestone cubes do not last long. But at length, after several experiments, wooden pavements made of brick-shaped blocks have been found to be very durable. Several varieties of colonial hardwood have been subjected to experiment, those that have proved the most suitable being blue gum, blackbutt, spotted-gum and tallow-wood. This new method of road making is expensive in the first instance, but the economy in maintenance is very great.

085 A Glimpse of Sydney from Darlinghurst

The licensed vehicles are under the management of a transit commission. There is one omnibus company which commands the business on the principal streets; the accommodation is excellent and the fares low. On several other roads the omnibuses are managed by private speculators. The characteristic conveyance of Sydney is the hansom cab, there being only a few two-horse vehicles. These cabs, mostly owned by their drivers, are of excellent quality, equal in general equipment to those of any city in the world.

Considering the extremely inflammable materials of which many of the Sydney buildings are composed, particularly those in the metropolitan suburbs, the small proportion of fires is somewhat remarkable. The fire brigade agency has lately been reorganised, and a metropolitan brigade has been appointed, under the control of an officer who is also the superintendent of all Sydney, fire brigades, volunteer or otherwise. The system is jointly subsidised by the Government, the municipal councils and the insurance companies. The temporary head fire station is in Bathurst Street. Its apparatus and general equipment are creditable, but thorough efficiency will not be attainable till the new metropolitan water supply is in full working order. The volunteer system has not been found to work satisfactorily, as the members are not sufficiently under control or amenable to discipline; but during the year 1885 a sum of two thousand five hundred Pounds was voted by the fire brigades board to the volunteer companies for the year’s services. At the board’s temporary central office the telephone system is fairly effective, the various branches of the metropolitan brigade, volunteer companies and police stations being connected. At one or two of the street corners alarm-boxes have been located, and the system will be gradually extended throughout the city and suburbs.

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