The Victorian Government has produced The New Lives of Old Quarries to recognise the quarrying history behind some of the state’s best-known public spaces.
The booklet reveals what kind of quarrying operations used to occur on sites like Melbourne’s Fitzroy Gardens, Highpoint Shopping Centre, Cranbourne’s Royal Botanic Gardens and Albert Park Lake.
The premise of the resource was to advocate for innovative rehabilitation plans to inspire the next generation of Victorian infrastructure – from the ashes of where the materials were sourced.
Victorian Resources Minister Jaala Pulford said it was just as important to recognise the part quarries play as it is to turn them into something else.
“Quarries are vital to build a state that provides for every person, regardless of where they live, and we know it’s just as important to plan for what happens when the extraction ends,” Pulford said.
“Old quarries have been transformed into some of our most-loved community assets and we’ll continue to make sure that’s the case.”
Fitzroy Gardens sits atop an old bluestone quarry that operated from about 1839 to 1849, All Nations Park in Northcote produced clay bricks in the 1870s and Valley Lake in Niddrie produced basalt from the 1940s to the ’70s.
Historical records tell us that many of Melbourne’s “warehouse and dwellings” were built from bluestone and basalt sourced from Quarries Park in Clifton Hill.
Victoria’s Extractives Strategy Taskforce oversees the implementation of the Helping Victoria Grow: Extractive Resources Strategy, and Taskforce chair John Krbaleski said the booklet should be a source of inspiration.
“You may be surprised. You may be inspired. A quarry may be temporary, but it supplies critical materials for our daily lives and the possibility for the future of quarried land is endless,” he said.
Source: www.quarrymagazine.com
