| Main | Births etc |
|---|
| Belmont Lake Macquarie, | |||||||||||||
| Population: | 6476 (2006 census) | ||||||||||||
| Established: | 1825 | ||||||||||||
| Postcode: | 2280 | ||||||||||||
| Area: | 8.8 km² (3.4 sq mi) | ||||||||||||
| Location: |
| ||||||||||||
| LGA: | City of Lake Macquarie | ||||||||||||
| Parish: | Kahibah | ||||||||||||
| State District: | Swansea, Charlestown | ||||||||||||
| Federal Division: | Shortland | ||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
Belmont is a suburb in the Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia, located 20 kilometres (12 mi) from Newcastle's central business district on the eastern side of Lake Macquarie and is part of the City of Lake Macquarie.
Belmont is situated on a sandy peninsula formed by the Tasman Sea on the east and Lake Macquarie.
History[]
The area around Belmont was inhabited by the Awabakal People. Traces of middens of shellfish, axe grinding grooves and place names can still be seen here. In 1825 Reverend Lancelot Edward Threlkeld established a mission at Belmont.[1]
He established small scale farming of wheat and Indian Corn and employed the local Aboriginal people to help him. While doing so, Threlkeld recorded the language of the Awabakal and produced the first serious works on aboriginal language, its grammar, usage, and relation to other aboriginal languages. The mission closed after a few years and Threlkeld moved to the Western side of Lake Macquarie.
Facilities[]
Belmont is home to many shops, restaurants and many other amenities. Belmont and the surrounding area also include 4 primary schools (Belmont Public School, Belmont North Public School, Floraville Public School and Jewells Public School) and 2 secondary schools, Belmont High School and Belmont Christian College.
Transport[]
Until May 2006, Aeropelican operated scheduled passenger services from Belmont Airport to Sydney Airport. The discontinuation of these services has all but closed the airfield, with owners seeking to develop the land. However, Belmont Airport has now been taken over by the owners of Warnervale Airport. The tar runway will be ripped up and a concrete runway laid. They are looking to resume a commuter service to Sydney in early 2008, which never happened.
Coal[]
Diesel railcar prepares to leave Newcastle Station for Belmont, c1972
John Darling Colliery
Many collieries, large and small, sought coal from the coal seams which were plentiful in the Belmont area, the largest of these being the BHP's John Darling Colliery at Belmont North. The New Redhead Estate & Coal Mining Company operated a railway until recent times from Belmont to Adamstown, a suburb of Newcastle,[2] where it joined the New South Wales Government Railways Main Line. The railway carried passenger trains as well as coal trains and served several collieries. Also, situated on a spur line just south of Belmont railway station, was a large railway coal loading facility, whereby motor trucks from collieries as far afield as Swansea, New South Wales, could load their coal into railway trucks for transporting to Newcastle's port. The smaller collieries closed due to the 1960s - 1970s slump in the industry, the last being Belltop Colliery. The larger collieries closed later.
Notable people[]
- Daniel Abraham (rugby league)
- Jack Marshall (rugby)
- Brendon Cook racing car driver
- Daniel Halangahu - rugby union player
- brothers Brock and Blake Mueller - rugby league players
- Alex Read football player
- Craig Whittaker British politician
References[]
| ||||||||
| This page uses content from the English language Wikipedia. The original content was at Belmont, New South Wales. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with this Familypedia wiki, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons License. |