Before 1800: Arrivals

When Britain’s First Fleet of 11 ships sailed into Port Jackson, Sydney, in January 1788, the mariners noted angry shouting from spear-carrying natives along the harbour’s
When Britain’s First Fleet of 11 ships sailed into Port Jackson, Sydney, in January 1788, the mariners noted angry shouting from spear-carrying natives along the harbour’s
In the early years of the 19th century, the west headland of Sydney Cove was distinguished by several crucial landmarks on the slopes of Windmill Hill
As the colony at Port Jackson prospered, its cargo shipping facilities expanded west from Sydney Cove to the much larger deepwater zone that was first named
Several new phenomona affected Sydney’s shipping industry after 1850: the advent of fast clipper ships (slicing freight times), a series of gold rushes in rural areas
In the late 1800s, Sydney’s economy and culture was surging—and the northern waterfront of Millers Point was one of the city’s busiest shipping precincts. Fast clipper
After two men from Ferry Lane in Millers Point died of bubonic fever in 1900, the state Government proclaimed a rat plague across the entire headland.
From the late 1920s, the freshly built Walsh Bay was disrupted by another major infrastructure project: the Sydney Harbour Bridge. This project had been first discussed
As Australia began a modern development boom following the Second World War, Walsh Bay’s wharves became gradually obsolete. They could still host some passenger ships but
Walsh Bay began to be transformed as a cultural precinct in the early 1980s, when Pier One was redeveloped as a harbourside ‘festival marketplace’ and Wharf
Since the latest redevelopment of the Walsh Bay precinct, the precinct and its surrounding neighbourhoods have been gentrifying. The area’s waterside apartments and townhouses have