Dry Creek is a mostly

industrial suburb An industrial suburb is a community, near a large city, with an industrial economy. These communities may be established as tax havens or as places where zoning promotes industry, or they may be industrial towns that become suburbs by urban spra ...

north of

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

, containing significant

wetlands A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded or saturated by water, either permanently (for years or decades) or seasonally (for weeks or months). Flooding results in oxygen-free (anoxic) processes prevailing, especially in the soils. The ...

. A substantial area was devoted to salt crystallisation pans until 2014, with plans to redevelop the site for housing. This housing plan, first put forward in 2008, was revived in 2013, for a proposed 10,000 homes. Salt production ceased in 2014, and in 2016 Ridley Corporation, which managed the salt pans, sold the land to Adelaide Resource Recovery.

Description

It is named for the Dry Creek, a stream and drain which flows through the suburb and into Swan Alley, a tidal distributary of

Barker Inlet The Barker Inlet is a tidal inlet of the Gulf St Vincent in Adelaide, South Australia, named after Captain Collet Barker who first sighted it in 1831. It contains one of the southernmost mangrove forests in the world, a dolphin sanctuary, seagra ...

Gulf St Vincent Gulf St Vincent, sometimes referred to as St Vincent Gulf, St Vincent's Gulf or Gulf of St Vincent, is the eastern of two large inlets of water on the southern coast of Australia, in the state of South Australia, the other being the larger Sp ...

. It was the site of the soapworks of W. H. Burford & Sons from 1923 (adjacent to the Dry Creek railway station, and formerly used for smelting ore from Broken Hill) and a pioneering "garden suburb" for its employees, designed by W. J. Earle (who also laid out Cadbury's model town at

Claremont, Tasmania Claremont is a rural / residential locality in the local government areas (LGA) of Glenorchy (75%) and Derwent Valley (25%) in the Hobart and South-east LGA regions of Tasmania. The locality is about north of the town of Glenorchy. The 2016 ...

). The name Burford Gardens has vanished, but its streets remain: Flame Avenue, Gum Avenue, Wattle Avenue, Grevillea Avenue and Bushwood Avenue.Burford Gardens - Wonderful Public Enthusiasm
''The Mail'' 14 April 1923 p.1 Retrieved 8 July 2011 The buildings of the former

Dry Creek explosives depot The Dry Creek explosives depot was a secure storage facility at Dry Creek, near Port Adelaide, from 1904 to 1995, serving the construction, mining and quarrying industries of South Australia and the mines of Broken Hill in New South Wales. o ...

, now State heritage-listed, are on Magazine Road between the Salisbury Highway South Road Connector and the salt pans.

Wetlands

The Dry Creek wetlands are composed of many separate sections running from the eastern edge of the suburb to the sea outlet of Dry Creek. They form part of the

storm water Stormwater, also spelled storm water, is water that originates from precipitation (storm), including heavy rain and meltwater from hail and snow. Stormwater can soak into the soil ( infiltrate) and become groundwater, be stored on depressed land ...

management system for the

City of Salisbury The City of Salisbury is a local government area (LGA) located on the northern fringes of Adelaide, South Australia. It had population of 137,979 people in 2016 and encompasses an area of 158 km². The council's main offices are situated in ...

and the

City of Port Adelaide Enfield The City of Port Adelaide Enfield, located across inner north and north-western suburbs of Adelaide, is one of the largest metropolitan councils within South Australia. It was established on 26 March 1996 by the amalgamation of the City of Por ...

and are connected to numerous drains that run across the

Adelaide Plains The Adelaide Plains (Kaurna name Tarndanya) is a plain in South Australia lying between the coast (Gulf St Vincent) on the west and the Mount Lofty Ranges on the east. The southernmost tip of the plain is in the southern seaside suburbs of Ade ...

including the eponymous Dry Creek, as well as being the outflow point for storm water pipes. Some of the wetlands have been extensively

landscaped Landscape architecture is the design of outdoor areas, landmarks, and structures to achieve environmental, social-behavioural, or aesthetic outcomes. It involves the systematic design and general engineering of various structures for constructio ...

but have only limited public access. The wetlands form a fauna and flora haven with one of the southernmost

mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline water, saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evoluti ...

habitats in the world, extensive reed and

samphire Samphire is a name given to a number of succulent salt-tolerant plants (halophytes) that tend to be associated with water bodies. *Rock samphire, ''Crithmum maritimum'' is a coastal species with white flowers that grows in Ireland, the Unit ...

beds and a large bird and fish population. They discharge via North Arm creek into the

. The wetlands are part of the

Gulf St Vincent Important Bird Area The Gulf St Vincent Important Bird Area comprises land extending along the coast of Gulf St Vincent, north of Adelaide, South Australia. Description The Gulf St Vincent Important Bird Area (IBA) is a strip of coastline containing the continuo ...

Transport

Dry Creek railway station Dry Creek railway station is located on the Gawler line. Situated in the inner northern Adelaide suburb of Dry Creek, it is from Adelaide station. History First opened in 1856, the station was rebuilt in 1982 and a bogie exchange facili ...

is located on the Gawler railway line. The

Northfield railway line The Northfield railway line (formerly Stockade railway line) was a railway in northern Adelaide running Dry Creek and Northfield. The line branched east from the Gawler railway line just north of Dry Creek station. In earlier years, it saw ...

, which branched eastwards from Dry Creek station, was closed in 1987. Dry Creek was a site of a

bogie exchange Bogie exchange is a system for operating railway wagons on two or more gauges to overcome difference in the track gauge. To perform a bogie exchange, a car is converted from one gauge to another by removing the bogies or trucks (the chassis cont ...

used to overcome a

Break of gauge With railways, a break of gauge occurs where a line of one track gauge (the distance between the rails, or between the wheels of trains designed to run on those rails) meets a line of a different gauge. Trains and rolling stock generally cannot ...

. The

Port River Expressway Port River Expressway is a freeway-grade road. The expressway links Port Adelaide and the LeFevre Peninsula across the north-western suburbs of Adelaide to major interstate routes via North-South Motorway. The expressway is only grade-separate ...

traverses Dry Creek east–west, and the

North–South Motorway The North–South Motorway is a partially complete motorway traversing the inner western suburbs of Adelaide from Waterloo Corner in the north to Bedford Park in the south. Progressively constructed in stages since 2010, once complete it will ...

provides a new north–south route through the suburb.

References

External links

City of Salisbury

City of Port Adelaide Enfield
{{City of Salisbury suburbs Suburbs of Adelaide

Description

Wetlands

Transport

See also

References

External links