Acton is a suburb of
Canberra,
ACT,
Australia. Acton covers an area west of the
CBD, bordered by
Black Mountain to the west and
Lake Burley Griffin
Lake Burley Griffin is an artificial lake in the centre of Canberra, the capital of Australia. It was completed in 1963 after the Molonglo River, which ran between the city centre and Parliamentary Triangle, was dammed. It is named after Wal ...
in the south. The
Australian National University
The Australian National University (ANU) is a public research university located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton encompasses seven teaching and research colleges, in addition to several national academies an ...
campus covers most of the suburb, though also located in Acton is the
National Film and Sound Archive, a branch of the
CSIRO and the
National Museum of Australia
The National Museum of Australia, in the national capital Canberra, preserves and interprets Australia's social history, exploring the key issues, people and events that have shaped the nation. It was formally established by the ''National Muse ...
.
At the Acton had a population of 2,848 people,
mostly students living at the Australian National University.
History
Acton was inhabited by
Aboriginal Australian
Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Isl ...
groups for thousands of years before European occupation. Part of this history is documented by the ANU Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Trail.
Sullivans Creek
Sullivans Creek, a partly perennial stream of the Murrumbidgee catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is located in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia.
Location and features
Sullivans Creek rises close to the border betwee ...
, which flows through Acton, provided a culturally significant source of food and resources for Aboriginal people. According to historian
Bill Gammage
William Leonard Gammage (born 1942) is an Australian academic historian, adjunct professor and senior research fellow at the Humanities Research Centre of the Australian National University (ANU).
Gammage was born in Orange, New South Wales, ...
, part of the area now used as the South Oval was purposely deforested by Aboriginal people, to form a grassland area that may have been used for hunting
kangaroo
Kangaroos are four marsupials from the family Macropodidae (macropods, meaning "large foot"). In common use the term is used to describe the largest species from this family, the red kangaroo, as well as the antilopine kangaroo, eastern ...
s, camping, or as an area to await
smoke signals from nearby.
Scarred trees in Acton suggest that their bark provided a valuable resource.
The suburb is named in recognition of one of the region's original homesteads 'Acton' which was sited near the present-day National Museum at the end of Liversidge Street.
With the establishment of the Federal Capital in 1911, territory administrators erected a temporary workers camp in the vicinity of 'Acton Homestead', since demolished, to house staff coordinating the development of the National Capital. The chief Surveyor Scrivener occupied Acton Homestead at an early stage during his survey of the capital site. The Bachelors' Quarters above Lennox Crossing, now renamed Lennox House, became the city's first guest house.
The alignment of Liversidge Street and Lennox Crossing follows the original line of the pre-1911 road towards the major ford across the Molonglo River. A low bridge and causeway was erected in 1911, at the site of the original river ford in an area subsequently inundated by
Lake Burley Griffin
Lake Burley Griffin is an artificial lake in the centre of Canberra, the capital of Australia. It was completed in 1963 after the Molonglo River, which ran between the city centre and Parliamentary Triangle, was dammed. It is named after Wal ...
.
The
Acton Tunnel
Acton Tunnel is a short road tunnel in Acton, Australian Capital Territory which opened in 1979. It carries the dual carriageway Parkes Way under a hill. The tunnel also comprises two upper levels, which have been used as an archival repository an ...
was built below a hill in the suburb between 1976 and 1979 as part on an extension of
Parkes Way
Parkes Way is a major road in Canberra, Australia, which runs east-west between Kings Avenue and the Glenloch Interchange. At Glenloch Interchange it intersects with William Hovell Drive, Tuggeranong Parkway, and Caswell Drive ( Gungahlin Dri ...
.
In 2011 a proposal was launched to build the
Australia Forum, a major convention centre complex, on the lake shoreline in Acton.
Demographics
In the , the population of Acton was 2,848.
In 2011, 56.9% of the population was foreign-born, the highest for any Canberra suburb.
Geology
The southern part of Acton has a complicated arrangement of
sediment
Sediment is a naturally occurring material that is broken down by processes of weathering and erosion, and is subsequently transported by the action of wind, water, or ice or by the force of gravity acting on the particles. For example, sa ...
s that include the Pittman Formation
greywacke
Greywacke or graywacke (German ''grauwacke'', signifying a grey, earthy rock) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness, dark color, and poorly sorted angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments or lit ...
and the black-coloured Acton Shale Member from the
Ordovician
The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period million years ago (Mya) to the start of the Silurian Period Mya.
T ...
age. Then from the
Silurian age there is mudstone, State Circle Shale, and Camp Hill Sandstone. Some limestone is found near the National Museum of Australia.
[
Calcareous shales from the Canberra Formation are overlain by Quaternary alluvium on the north. This rock is the limestone of the original title of Canberra, "Limestone Plains". Tertiary-age pebbly gravels are left from when the Molonglo river was at a higher level.][Henderson G A M and Matveev G, Geology of Canberra, Queanbeyan and Environs 1:50000 1980.]
Notes and references
{{North Canberra Suburbs
Suburbs of Canberra