Bonner is a suburb in the district of

Gungahlin The District of Gungahlin () is one of the original eighteen districts of the Australian Capital Territory used in land administration. The Gungahlin Region is one of fastest growing regions within Australia. The district is subdivided into di ...

Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...

in Australia. The suburb is named in memory after Senator

Neville Bonner Neville Thomas Bonner AO (28 March 19225 February 1999) was an Australian politician, and the first Aboriginal Australian to become a member of the Parliament of Australia. He was appointed by the Queensland Parliament to fill a casual vacancy ...

, Australia's first Indigenous parliamentarian who served the people of Queensland during the years 1971–1984. The suburb is bounded by Horse Park Drive, Mulligans Flat Road, and Roden Cutler Drive and is approximately from the Gungahlin Town Centre and from the centre of Canberra. It is adjacent to the suburbs of Jacka, Amaroo and Forde. Settlement of the suburb began in 2010 and it had an estimated population of 6,730 at the .

History

Bonner is situated on the former paddocks of "Horse Park", a sheep property established in 1853 by Irish immigrants John and Ann Gillespie. From these humble beginnings, the Gillespies increased their pastoral holdings through the judicious acquisitions of neighbouring properties such as "Elm Grove" (situated in present-day Forde). Their son James Gillespie was instrumental in establishing the Mulligans Flat Public School. The remnants of the school are located in the nearby Mulligans Flat Reserve. Gillespie was a regularly contributor to the Goulburn Evening Penny Post under the pseudonym "The Wizard". "Horse Park" homestead which has been nominated for the ACT Heritage Register is situated a kilometre west in the suburb of Jacka.

Population

In the 2016 Census, there were 6,730 people in Bonner. 57.5% of people were born in Australia. The next most common countries of birth were India 9.5%,

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

2.3%,

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

2.3%, China 2.3% and

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

2.2%. 52.9% of people spoke only English at home. Other languages spoken at home included

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

3.3%,

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

Punjabi 3.0%,

Mandarin Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to: Language * Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country ** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China ** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...

2.6% and

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

2.5%. The most common responses for religion in Bonner (State Suburbs) were No Religion, so described 24.7%,

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

20.6%,

Hinduism Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...

10.4% and

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

8.5%.

Religious organizations

The Sisters of

Our Lady of Peace Our Lady of Peace, Mother of Peace, Queen of Peace or Our Lady Queen of Peace is a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Roman Catholic Church. She is represented in art holding a dove and an olive branch, symbols of peace. Her official memoria ...

have a presence in the local community. The order celebrates the

Feast Day The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context d ...

of the Presentation of Our Lord on the 2nd of February each year.

Local facilities

A local shopping centre is positioned at the geographical centre of the suburb close to the areas designated for

medium-density housing Medium-density housing is a term used within urban planning and academic literature to refer to a category of residential development that falls between detached suburban housing and large multi-story buildings. There is no singular definition of m ...

. The local Primary School is at the centre of its catchment, which comprises Bonner, Forde and the southern portion of Jacka. It adjoins the Local Centre and playing fields. Taken together these facilities create a social nucleus for the new suburb. A local primary school site is located at the centre of Bonner to also serve Forde, to the east, and Jacka to the west. The school is close to the Local Centre, Community Facilities, the playing fields. The Mulligans Flat Nature Reserve is situated on the north-eastern edge of the suburb. In 2009 streets were named after important figures from local aboriginal communities: Lamilami,

Mondalmi Mondalmi (born c. 1910; died 23 October 1969) was an Aboriginal activist and cultural informant from Australia. Biography Mondalmi was born around 1910 in Wighu, South Goulburn Island, Western Arnhem Land (although her brother, in his autobio ...

. Like most new Canberra suburbs, Bonner is in a cat containment area: all cats have to be kept inside the cat owner's property and within an enclosure if outside.

Geography

Bonner occupies 283 hectares and at its highest point is situated is 715 metres above sea level (ASL) while its lowest point on the southernmost reach is 624 metres. The suburb slopes southward towards

Ginninderra Creek Ginninderra Creek, a partly perennial stream of the Murrumbidgee catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is located in the Capital Country region spanning both the Australian Capital Territory and New South Wales, Australia. ''Ginninderr ...

. Oak Hill dominates the northern horizon which is 800 metres above sea level and situated on the north-west boundary of the

Australian Capital Territory The Australian Capital Territory (commonly abbreviated as ACT), known as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) until 1938, is a landlocked federal territory of Australia containing the national capital Canberra and some surrounding townships. ...

Geology

Rocks in Bonner are from the late middle

Silurian The Silurian ( ) is a geologic period and system spanning 24.6 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Devonian Period, Mya. The Silurian is the shortest period of the Paleozo ...

period and are called Canberra Formation. They are mostly

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...

shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4) and tiny fragments (silt-sized particles) of other minerals, especial ...

and

mudstone Mudstone, a type of mudrock, is a fine-grained sedimentary rock whose original constituents were clays or muds. Mudstone is distinguished from '' shale'' by its lack of fissility (parallel layering).Blatt, H., and R.J. Tracy, 1996, ''Petrology. ...

. A band of

dacite Dacite () is a volcanic rock formed by rapid solidification of lava that is high in silica and low in alkali metal oxides. It has a fine-grained (aphanitic) to porphyritic texture and is intermediate in composition between andesite and rhyolite. ...

follows a ridge in the north east direction in the western third. Also

ashstone Tuff is a type of rock made of volcanic ash ejected from a vent during a volcanic eruption. Following ejection and deposition, the ash is lithified into a solid rock. Rock that contains greater than 75% ash is considered tuff, while rock cont ...

occurs on a hill top in the north west corner of Bonner.Henderson G A M and Matveev G, Geology of Canberra, Queanbeyan and Environs 1:50000 1980.

Footnotes

* {{Gungahlin Suburbs Suburbs of Canberra