Darling Street

Rozelle Public School, designed by John Horbury Hunt

Darling Street, running along the ridge of the Balmain Peninsula in inner-west Sydney, Australia, from the East Balmain Ferry Wharf to Victoria Road, is the main thoroughfare and high street of the suburbs of Balmain and Rozelle, and a noted café and restaurant strip.

Balmain Market is on the corner of Darling and Curtis Road.^[1]

History

In 1875, Darling Street received its first instillation of gas lighting. The effect of this was so that during the late 1880s there was an increase of business due to the increase of illumination along the shopping strip at night. Twenty years prior to this the area where the town hall is now located was occupied by bushland.

Trams

Tram 2010 at the Darling Street Wharf, Balmain

Main article: Trams in Sydney

Trams once ran all the way down Darling Street to the Wharf at Balmain East. The first steam tram to service Darling street was in 1892. Ten years later the service was electrified.^[2] A feature of this line was a counterweight dummy system that controlled and assisted trams on a steep single-line section of track near the terminus at Darling Wharf. Due to the very steep incline at the bottom of the street, the trams used a complex 'dummy' counterweight system constructed under the road surface. The trams were pushed up the steep hill by the dummy, and rode the dummy on the way down to safely descend the hill.

A cross country connection between the Canterbury Line at New Canterbury Road and the Western Suburbs lines on Parramatta Road allowed for a cross country service to operate between Canterbury train station and Balmain Wharf via Darling Road. The Darling Street tram line was serviced by the Rozelle Tram Depot in Glebe.

Gladstone Park Reservoir

Construction of the Gladstone Park Reservoir was announced in 1912 causing public outcry. The water board reassured residents that the park and bandstand would be restored to its former status once the reservoir was complete. Before construction of the reservoir residents obtained their water supply from backyard wells or water carts. Completed in 1917 the reservoir is still intact and the water is now used for reserve supply only.

References

Route map: Bing / Google

↑ Street Markets in Sydney, Australia Travel Guide.
↑ A Pictorial History of Balmain, page 11

Streets of Sydney, Australia

City of Sydney	Bathurst Street Bridge Street Bayswater Road Broadway Castlereagh Street Cleveland Street City Road College Street Crown Street Eddy Avenue Elizabeth Street Five Ways George Street Glebe Point Road Goulburn Street Grosvenor Street Harris Street Hunter Street King Street Lime Street Liverpool Street Macquarie Street Market Street Martin Place Oxford Street Park Street Phillip Street Pitt Street Rowe Street Stanley Street Sussex Street Victoria Street Whitlam Square William Street York Street

Suburban roads	Albion Street Anzac Parade Appian Way Bangor Bypass Blacktown Road Bondi Road Burnt Bridge Creek Deviation City West Link Coogee Bay Road Darling Street Epping Road General Holmes Drive Gore Hill Freeway Great North Road Great Western Highway Henry Lawson Drive Hume Highway James Ruse Drive Jeffrey Street King Georges Road King Street Lane Cove Road New South Head Road Norton Street Old South Head Old Windsor Road Parramatta Road Pennant Hills Road Pittwater Road Princes Highway Prospect Highway Richmond Road Ryde Road Southern Cross Drive Taren Point Road Victoria Road Windsor Road

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, April 16, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.

Darling Street

History

Trams

Gladstone Park Reservoir

See also

References