Emu Heights is a locality and suburb of

Burnie Burnie is a port city on the north-west coast of Tasmania, Australia. When founded in 1827, it was named Emu Bay, being renamed after William Burnie, a director of the Van Diemen's Land Company, in the early 1840s. , Burnie had an urban popul ...

in the local government area of

City of Burnie Burnie City Council (or City of Burnie) is a Local government in Australia, local government body in Tasmania, located in the city and surrounds of Burnie, Tasmania, Burnie in the north-west of the state. The Burnie local government area is cl ...

, in the

North West The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each sepa ...

region of

Tasmania ) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdi ...

. It is located about south-east of the town of Burnie. The Emu River forms the eastern boundary, and the railway tracks of the

Melba line The Melba Line is a narrow-gauge railway on the West Coast of Tasmania. The line was originally constructed as a private railway line named the Emu Bay Railway and was one of the longest-lasting and most successful private railway companies i ...

form most of the western. The 2016 census determined a population of 180 for the state suburb of Emu Heights.

History

The municipal area of City of Burnie, of which Emu Heights is part, was proclaimed a city on 26 Apr 1988. It was previously named Emu Bay Municipality. The municipality and the bay to its north were named for the Emu River, which was named in 1827 by explorer

Henry Hellyer Henry Hellyer (1790 – September 1832) was an English surveyor and architect who was one of the first explorers to visit the rugged interior of the north west of Tasmania, Australia and made the most comprehensive maps of the area up to that time ...

for

emu The emu () (''Dromaius novaehollandiae'') is the second-tallest living bird after its ratite relative the ostrich. It is endemic to Australia where it is the largest native bird and the only extant member of the genus ''Dromaius''. The emu' ...

tracks seen in the vicinity. It is believed that the name of this locality has the same derivation.

Road infrastructure

The C112 route (Old Surrey Road) runs south from the Bass Highway through the locality, and from there provides access to the B18 route (Ridgley Highway) which leads to the

Murchison Highway The Murchison Highway is a highway located in the West Coast region of Tasmania, Australia. The highway runs generally north–south, with Somerset, near Burnie, as its northern terminus and Zeehan as its southern terminus. The highway was ...

References

{{authority control Suburbs of Burnie, Tasmania Towns in Tasmania