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Evolving Eveleigh

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Stories from the Paint Shop

Passionate railway aficionados have brought the Paint Shop back to life, restoring Sputniks, Red Rattlers and a 103 year old wooden train carriage.
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The Making of South Eveleigh

As Eveleigh's industrial working life ended, a new age of activity dawned.
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Evolution of Eveleigh - The Railway workshops

Hard to imagine now, but before these rugged industrial edifices of brick and iron arose, this place was tranquil sandhills and wetlands – the Black Wattle Swamp.
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  • 1840

    During the 1840s, government legislation is passed ordering polluting industries to move from the Tank Stream. They move into Redfern and Waterloo, establishing industrial suburbs. Redfern develops terrace housing and villas.
  • John Whitton, photographer Scott Montagu, circa 1870 view

    1856

    John Whitton is appointed NSW Railways Engineer-in-Chief.

  • 1871

    The Metropolitan Workshops at Redfern Railway Yard are extended and planning for Eveleigh Railway Workshops commences.

  • 1875

    The Eveleigh site is chosen for railway workshops development.
  • Eveleigh Locomotive Workshops, circa 1889 view

    1882

    During 1882 to 1887 the principal workshops are built at Eveleigh.

  • 1882

    Eveleigh Railway Workshops building program commences.
  • NSW Railways Diagram of Eveleigh Workshops, 1887 view

    1887

    Locomotive Workshops are completed.

  • 1887

    Carriage Workshops completed.
  • View towards Carriage Works from Cornwallis St, Works Managers Office and Water Tower in foreground, undated view

    1887

    Manager’s Office completed.

  • 1887

    Paint Shop completed.

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An Indigenous Place

Eveleigh is Gadigal country. We acknowledge their ownership of this land and pay our respects to past, present and emerging elders.
The paddocks

The second half of the nineteenth century saw a rapid expansion in New South Wales railways. In Sydney, this meant both the early stations and workshop facilities quickly became too small, and had to be expanded or relocated.
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An Indigenous Place
The paddocks
Like a living thing
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Eveleigh stories in time...
40,000 BC

Pre contact – Members of Cadigal, or Gadigal, people inhabit Redfern, Erskineville and surrounds. The Gadigal Traditional Owners who today speak for the Sydney clan area stretched “from the south side of Port Jackson from South Head to Petersham”. The Gadigal people spoke the coastal Eora dialect of the Darug language and are often referred to as the Eora people. Redfern as a site was important to its people because it had a source of water – Shea's Creek, which today is Alexandra Canal, as well as a source of food from the wetlands that drained into the creek. Redfern’s high point on the terrain offered views of the trade route from Circular Quay to Parramatta, on which the colony’s first railway would be built. These trade routes connected with larger routes which linked the north and south, and east and west of Australia. Not only goods, but ideas, songs, ceremonies and news travelled along these routes.
1788

The British arrive in January with catastrophic effect on the Aboriginal way of life. The Eora people do not flee, as Captain James Cook predicted, but stand their ground. Governor Phillip attempts to create good relations, but these soon disintegrate due to the persecution of the Aboriginals by the convicts. The Aboriginals are pushed out of Sydney town with fear of being shot, and with the quick pollution of the Tank Stream by tanneries, they are forced to use water sources near Redfern.
1789

The smallpox plague devastates the Aboriginal people. Without immunity to the disease brought by the British, a large percentage of the Cadigal clan is wiped out. Following the plague, survivors from surrounding clans join together to survive, and to participate in the guerrilla movement led by Pemulwuy.
1791

James Chisholm arrives in the colony of New South Wales aged 19 as a non-commissioned officer.
1793

Settler David Collins observes Cadigal people performing a ceremony “between the town and the brickfield”.
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