City of Broadmeadows

The City of Broadmeadows was a local government area about 20km north of Melbourne, the state capital of Victoria, Australia. The city covered an area of 63.65km2, and existed from 1857 until 1994.HistoryBroadmeadows was first incorporated as a road district on 27 November 1857. It became a shire on 27 January 1871.On 1 October 1915, as part of a series of adjustments of local government boundaries in Victoria, Broadmeadows briefly absorbed Merriang Shire, a 312km2 area, including the towns of Kalkallo, Donnybrook and Wallan and dating from 1863. Many of these areas were transferred to the Shire of Romsey on 31 May 1916.With the arrival of reticulated water, electricity and electrified rail in the 1920s, the southern part of the shire was opened up to residential development. However, the Great Depression reduced the demand for new housing, and small farms and derelict subdivisions were major features of the landscape. The Australian Blue Book described the shire in 1949 as "comprising general farming and grazing country which stretches in a narrow strip northward from the northern suburbs of Melbourne", noting that southern areas adjoining Coburg and Essendon were "becoming definitely residential, but in other parts grazing, dairying, poultry farming and hay and grain growing is still going on".