Alma Park is a park in St Kilda East,

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

, Australia, in the

local government area A local government area (LGA) is an administrative division of a country that a local government is responsible for. The size of an LGA varies by country but it is generally a subdivision of a State (administrative division), state, province, divi ...

of the city of

Port Phillip Port Phillip (Kulin languages, Kulin: ''Narm-Narm'') or Port Phillip Bay is a horsehead-shaped bay#Types, enclosed bay on the central coast of southern Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia. The bay opens into the Bass Strait via a short, ...

Location

It is bounded by private properties to the east and west,

Dandenong Road Princes Highway is a major road in Australia, extending from Sydney via Melbourne to Adelaide through the states of New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. It has a length of (along Highway 1) or via the former alignments of the hig ...

to the north, and Alma Road to the south. Alma Park is the main park for residents of St Kilda East and

Windsor Windsor may refer to: Places Australia * Windsor, New South Wales ** Municipality of Windsor, a former local government area * Windsor, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland **Shire of Windsor, a former local government authority around Wi ...

. It includes a hexagonal rotunda described as "a rare Victorian example of an early twentieth century park rotunda" and the former Keepers Lodge, which are both registered on the

Register of the National Estate The Register of the National Estate was a heritage register that listed natural and cultural heritage places in Australia that was closed in 2007. Phasing out began in 2003, when the Australian National Heritage List and the Commonwealth Heritag ...

. The park was originally designed by

Clement Hodgkinson Clement Hodgkinson (1818 – 5 September 1893) was a notable English naturalist, explorer and surveyor of Australia. He was Victorian Assistant Commissioner of Crown Lands and Survey from 1861 to 1874. Exploration in New South Wales Qualified ...

, and includes two children's playgrounds, a

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

and

football (soccer) Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

oval and large stands of

elm Elms are deciduous and semi-deciduous trees comprising the flowering plant genus ''Ulmus'' in the plant family Ulmaceae. They are distributed over most of the Northern Hemisphere, inhabiting the temperate and tropical-montane regions of North ...

trees,

Moreton Bay Fig ''Ficus macrophylla'', commonly known as the Moreton Bay fig or Australian banyan, is a large evergreen banyan tree of the family Moraceae native to eastern Australia, from the Wide Bay–Burnett region in the north to the Illawarra in New So ...

s, bike paths and native vegetation areas.

Railway line

In 1859, the construction of the then Brighton railway line from St Kilda severed the park into two. The line was sunken through the park to facilitate grade separations at

Chapel Street Chapel Street is a street in Melbourne, Victoria, running along the inner suburbs of South Yarra, Prahran, Windsor, St Kilda and St Kilda East. Route Chapel Street is essentially straight and runs for over 4.14 kilometres along an approxim ...

, Dandenong Road, and Alma Road. The train line now forms part of the Sandringham line from Flinders Street. Its sunken grade now also provides for uninterrupted view of amenities across the park. Image:Rotunda_alma_park.jpg, Hexagonal rotunda in Alma Park, probably built between 1910 and 1915

References

*Melway Great Melbourne Street Directory (2007)

External links

* Parks in Victoria (Australia) City of Port Phillip St Kilda East, Victoria {{VictoriaAU-geo-stub