Moorabbin is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

, 15 km south-east of Melbourne's

Central Business District A central business district (CBD) is the commercial and business centre of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides with the "city ...

, located within the City of Kingston

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 ...

. Moorabbin recorded a population of 6,287 at the . Most of the eastern side of Moorabbin has been an industrial area since the first development in the mid-1960s. Major businesses with a presence in the area include Coca-Cola. Moorabbin is also well known locally for its residential area built after World War II.

History

The word ''Moorabbin'' is believed to have come from the

Aboriginal Aborigine, aborigine or aboriginal may refer to: *Aborigines (mythology), in Roman mythology * Indigenous peoples, general term for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area *One of several groups of indigenous peoples, see ...

word moorooboon meaning ''mother's milk'', as it was purportedly a place where women and children stayed and rested while the men hunted further afield. In 1846 the first European settlers arrived, brothers John and Richard King, who are thought to have come from the Western Port area. The Post Office opened on 1 September 1857 as South Brighton, was renamed Brighton South around 1886 and Moorabbin in 1909. The Moorabbin East Post Office near Chesterville Road opened in 1960. The seat of local government moved from Moorabbin to Cheltenham when the former City of Moorabbin was incorporated into the larger City of Kingston. In August 1998, Moorabbin was the scene of the Silk-Miller police murders.

Transport

While by name ''Moorabbin'' would appear to be home to the regional general airport Moorabbin Airport, the airport, also called th
Harry Hawker Airport
is its own suburb, sharing the postcode of 3194 with Mentone. Moorabbin is serviced by a variety of

Public Transport Victoria Public Transport Victoria (PTV) is the brand name for public transport in the Australian state of Victoria, Australia, Victoria. It was the trading name of the Go Public Transport Development Authority (PTDA), a now-defunct statutory authorit ...

bus and train services including Moorabbin station.

Housing

Housing in Moorabbin comprises mainly 3-bedroom red or cream brick detached houses built between the 1940s and 1970s. More recently villa units and townhouses have been built.

Notable places in Moorabbin

The Moorabbin Campus of the Holmesglen Institute of TAFE is located in Moorabbin, the campus formerly belonging to the Chisholm Institute and before that was the location of Moorabbin Technical College. Moorabbin has two public primary schools (Moorabbin Primary, Southmoor Primary) and one Catholic primary (St. Catherines Primary). Moorabbin High School closed in 1984 but the former campus is now being used by the Bayside Special Development School, which provides individual programs for children with special needs. The

Gould League The Gould League is an independent Australian organisation promoting Natural environment, environmental education, founded in Victoria, Australia, Victoria in 1909 and named after the English ornithologist John Gould. Largely autonomous branche ...

also uses the former Moorabbin High School site and specializes in education that relates to the environment and sustainability.

Sport

The suburb has an

Australian Rules Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

football team, Moorabbin Kangaroos Football Club, competing in the

Southern Football League The Southern League is a men's football competition featuring semi-professional clubs from the South and Midlands of England. Together with the Isthmian League and the Northern Premier League it forms levels seven and eight of the English fo ...

. The football and cricket venue in the suburb is Moorabbin Oval, located in Linton Street. The ground was used by the

St Kilda Football Club The St Kilda Football Club, nicknamed the Saints, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, Victoria. The club plays in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's premier league. The club ...

in VFL/AFL games between 1965 and 1992, and continued to serve as its training and administrative home ground until 2010. From 2018 the ground has again become the training, entertainment, member and community base for the Saints. The former Australian Touring Car Championship team Perkins Engineering was based at Moorabbin Airport.

Notable people

* Sir Thomas Bent, politician and land speculator * Bernard Evans, architect *

Elizee de Garis Elisha Clement "Elizee" De Garis (17 September 1851 – 2 July 1948) was an Australian irrigationist. De Garis was born at Saint Martin in Guernsey in the Channel Islands to carpenter Elisha De Garis and Mary, ''née'' Roberts. In 1854 the De Gar ...

, farmer and shire councillor *

Harry Hawker Harry George Hawker, MBE, AFC (22 January 1889 – 12 July 1921) was an Australian aviation pioneer. He was the chief test pilot for Sopwith and was also involved in the design of many of their aircraft. After the First World War, he co-fou ...

, aviator * William Highett, banker and politician

References

External links

Australian Places: Melbourne, Victoria
{{Authority control Suburbs of Melbourne Suburbs of the City of Kingston (Victoria) 1857 establishments in Australia