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Upfield Railway (Brunswick & Coburg)

Location

ALBERT ST, ALBION ST, BRUNSWICK RD, DAWSON ST, HOPE ST, PARK ST UNION ST, VICTORIA ST BRUNSWICK and BELL ST, MORELAND RD, MUNRO ST & REYNARD ST COBURG, MORELAND CITY

File Number

3543

Level

Included in Heritage Overlay

[1/8]
Upfield Railway Line Precinct
[2/8]
Upfield Railway Line Precinct
[3/8]
Upfield Railway Line Precinct
[4/8]
Upfield Railway Line Precinct
[5/8]
Upfield Railway Line Precinct
[6/8]
Coburg Station
[7/8]
Jewel Station
[8/8]
Brunswick Station

Statement of Significance

What is significant?
The Upfield Railway Line Precinct comprises the Jewell, Brunswick, Moreland and Coburg Railway Stations, and other buildings, structures, gates and signals between Park Street, Brunswick and Coburg Railway Station, Coburg.

The heritage place includes:

The four stations from Park Street to Coburg Station, the gatekeepers' cabins and gates, signal boxes, footbridges and other railway structures. These are mapped by the Heritage Council of Victoria as part of the State Heritage listing of the precinct.

How is it significant?
The Railway Precinct is of state historical, technological, architectural and social significance. The group of railway structures-which includes stations, gatekeepers' cabins and gates, signalling equipment and a footbridge-provides remarkably intact evidence of the technology and architecture of a late 19th and early 20th century railway system, and retains elements now rare or unique within the metropolitan area. The inter-relationship of these structures results in an entity-the Upfield line as a whole-which is of greater significance than its individual parts. The Precinct remains a lively, vital linear element in the fabric of the City of Moreland.

Why is it significant?
The Upfield Railway Line Precinct is of state historical significance as a rare and remarkably intact section of Melbourne's metropolitan railway system from the late 19th and early 20th century, which was an important component of city development and city life during that period and afterward.

The Upfield Railway Line Precinct is of state technical and architectural significance because while most suburban lines have been modified and updated, the Upfield line retains a unique collection of hand and wheel operated railway gates, and their associated buildings and installations, reflecting a safe working procedure more typical of the nineteenth rather than the twentieth century. These include the biggest group of hand operated gates and gate-keepers cabins in Victoria.  The original stations on the line - Jewell (originally South Brunswick), Brunswick, Moreland and Coburg - are built of brick in a late Victorian Gothic style to a similar, standard plan. Although other examples of the plan exist (eg Maldon) this grouping of four in such close proximity is unique adding a cohesion to the precinct.

The Upfield Railway Line Precinct is of state social significance as a lively, vital linear element in the fabric of the City of Moreland.

Group