BACKGROUND

Yarra Bend Park is Crown land managed by the Yarra Bend Park Trust under the Kew and Heidelberg Lands Act 1933.  Since April 1997, Parks Victoria has managed the day to day operation of the Park in partnership with the Trust.

 

LOCATION AND SIZE

Yarra Bend Park is 4 km east of Melbourne.  Comprising 260 hectares the Park contains the largest

remaining area of natural bushland within inner Melbourne 

 

ABORIGINAL OCCUPATION

Four separate Aboriginal tribes are known to have originally inhabited the Port Phillip region. Collectively they formed the Kulin nation or confederacy. Each tribe inhabited a particular area of the Melbourne region. Various clans of the Wurundjeri tribe originally occupied the areas to the north and east of Melbourne, which includes the present Yarra Bend Park. The area would have provided reliable sources of water as well as a rich and diverse supply of plant and animal resources for food, medicines, shelter, clothing and tools. However, little evidence remains of previous Aboriginal occupation in the areaother than several scarred trees along the Yarra River upstream of Yarra Bend Park. See the Section "Aboriginal Heritage"

 

EUROPEAN HISTORY

Yarra Bend and neighbouring Studley Park were reserved in 1877. Both Park areas and several reserves were combined in the early 1920s to create one large park, which became known as Yarra Bend Park. During the 1930s additions to the Park included picnic and sporting grounds, toilet facilities and public golf courses.

 

INSTITUTIONS

A number of institutions were established on the land of Yarra Bend Park throughout the nineteenth century. These included the Merri Creek School (an Aboriginal mission School established in 1848), the Yarra Bend Lunatic Asylum (established in 1848 and decommissioned in 1925), the Queen’s Memorial Infectious Diseases Hospital (established in 1904, now Fairfield Hospital) and Fairlea Women’s Prison (established in March 1956 and closed in August 1996).

 

URBAN DEVELOPMENT

The Yarra Boulevard was constructed during the 1930s depression and resulted in greater public access and use of the new Park. The Eastern Freeway bisected the Park in the 1970s, but attempts to lay the Brunswick-Richmond power line through the Park in the 1980s failed due to strong community opposition.

 

SPORTING VENUES

 

Several sporting areas are located within the Park – some of these date back to the early 1900s

 

• Sir Arthur Rylah Oval – next to Studley Park Golf Course, Studley Park Rd (established in 1960s)

• Collins Bridge Reserve – near Andrews Reserve,  next to Yarra Boulevard

• Yarra Bend Golf Course – at the end of Yarra Bend Rd (established 1934, on site of former Prison)

• Studley Park Golf Course – off Walder St (established in the 1960s)

• Fairlea Ovals – at Fairlea Rd, off Yarra Bend Rd

• Corben Oval – across the Yarra opposite Kanes Bridge

• W. T. Long Oval – off Yarra Bend Rd

• Sir Herbert Olney Oval – off Deep Rock Rd

• Westfield Ovals – off Yarra Bend Rd

• Fly Fishing Centre - at the end of Fairlea Rd (constructed in the 1950s)