Western Sydney Parklands
Historical context
Aboriginal perspective
Aboriginal people have lived continuously in the Western Sydney area for thousands of years with a few distinct language groups including the Darug, Darginung and Dharawal occupying parts of the region.
The lands now covered by the Parklands are described as a transitional area that was shared between neighbouring cultural groupings and widely used as a travel and trade route between various Aboriginal groups in the broader region.
The ridgeline generally forms the core of this transitional zone with Eastern Creek representing a major line of trade and travel. The presence of a creek also provided a valuable source of fresh water for those passing through and local communities.
The Aboriginal community of the region places high significance on the area around Rooty Hill. This association is derived from conflicts during the early 1800s referred to as the Rooty Hill Wars, where in open warfare the noted Aboriginal warrior Pemulwuy was killed.
European settlement
The landscape character of the Cumberland Plain was seen by the early colonialists as a large fertile bowl covered by open woodland, dissected by small and easily crossable creeks. It was for this reason that exploration of the area progressed so rapidly and was indeed completed by 1813.
With more substantial water supplies and better soils provided by the creek systems further west, the Eastern Creek valley and the southern ridge of the Parklands were considerably less settled and initially subdivided for a few larger grazing properties.
Early settlements (around 1870) in the Parklands were more concentrated around the rich volcanic soils of Prospect Hill with settlements then following alongside the main western road linking Parramatta with Emu Plains.
Construction of Prospect Reservoir in the 1880s stimulated the growth of Prospect Village to accommodate a labour force and to provide services such as the Post Office and the Cricketers Arms Hotel, both of which remain today as heritage listed buildings.
Settlement, near and around the Parklands in the early 20th century was consolidated around existing towns and along major roads.
Following World War II, a major expansion of population in the area was boosted by migration from Europe with many families settling in Western Sydney. The migration wave was a dominant factor to the current visible landscape of the Parklands with market gardening becoming an economic industry in south-west Sydney. Small land holdings with fibro-clad houses, packing sheds and glasshouses was a typical characteristic of the area.
Identification of the Parklands
The Parklands, comprising the Eastern Creek, Prospect, Horsley Park and Hoxton Park open and special space corridors was first identified in the 1968 Sydney Region Outline Plan. At that time government planners advocated that a major program was needed to acquire enough lands to satisfy the demand for regional open space in the future.
Public inquiries into corridor proposals in the 1970s brought about by subdivision pressures, and coinciding with Sydney’s era of ‘green bans’, were undertaken by Walter Ralston Bunning and Professor Arthur Denis Winston.
By early 1974 the boundaries of the Eastern Creek and Hoxton Park corridors were confirmed and controls of these lands were in local planning schemes. Active periods of acquisition then saw approximately 70 per cent of the identified Western Sydney corridor of lands in public ownership by 1978.
In 1989, the area of Eastern Creek was gazetted under “SEPP No 29 - Western Sydney Recreation Area” which saw the approval of the Eastern Creek Raceway. These corridors provided the lands for the 2000 Olympic Games with spaces for rowing, equestrian, shooting, baseball, softball and mountain biking.
In 2001 the "Sydney Regional Environmental Plan No 31 - Regional Parklands" (SREP 31) was prepared to respond to the complex issues involved in balancing and assessing development in the Parklands, particularly residential developments that had reached the Parklands’ edges.
SREP 31 is intended to provide the planning framework for the area and to balance a broad range of land use objectives, with long term land use guided by Development Control Plans and a Management Vision.
In November 2004 the Western Parklands Management Vision was prepared to map out the transformation of old farming paddocks to create accessible recreation areas and regenerate natural bushlands and habitat for local wildlife.
The Management Vision was created in partnership with local councils, the Department of Environment and Conservation, the Department of Tourism, Sport and Recreation, the Sydney Catchment Authority and the then, Department for Infrastructure, Planning and Natural Resources, now the Department of Planning.