Mudgeeraba, Queensland

Mudgeeraba is a suburb in the Gold Coast Hinterland in Queensland, Australia. At the 2011 Australian Census, the suburb recorded a population of 13,204.Mudgeeraba's essential character remains one of a nineteenth-century village, and contains important evidence of its earlier form and building. Most older houses are situated on large blocks of 0.5acre to 2acre, alongside much larger farming properties situated in the area.It is thought that the name of the town was derived from an Indigenous Australian expression meaning, "place of infant's excrement", "place where someone told lies" or "place of sticky soil". Another theory is that the name means "low-lying ground".HistoryMudgeeraba is remnant of the type of township that characterises the rural hinterland of the Gold Coast. Subdivision of land was conventional and buildings were traditionally rural or rural commercial. The Schmidt Farmhouse is typical of farms of that period in the district (the farmhouse is now in the adjacent suburb of Worongary).Mudgeeraba, like other areas in the region, was an early centre for farming, timber getting and cattle grazing by the mid-1870s. It rose to some prominence with the coming of the railway from Brisbane to Tweed Heads in 1903. The station of the South Coast railway line was located near the present-day motorway entrance. In 1890, the Queensland State Government indicated that the railway station would be positioned as close to the township, located on Coach Road, as possible. Following the decision was made to position the railway station at some distance to the town, early residents acquired land nearby. Once the railway line was in operation the centre of the town was relocated to its present position. The railway was closed in 1961. The modern day Pacific Motorway largely follows the route of the former railway. The new Gold Coast railway opened on a different alignment from Brisbane to neighbouring Robina in 1998. Robina station is about 1.8 km further than the old Mudgeeraba railway station.