Oxley Highway is a rural highway in

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

, Australia, linking

Nevertire Nevertire is a rural village in New South Wales, Australia. It is located at the junction of the Mitchell Highway and the Oxley Highway, in Warren Shire. Nevertire is about 496 kilometres northwest of Sydney, 78 km north-west of Narromine ...

Gilgandra Gilgandra is a country town in the Orana region of New South Wales, Australia, and services the surrounding agricultural area where wheat is grown extensively together with other cereal crops, and sheep and beef cattle are raised. Sitting at t ...

Coonabarabran Coonabarabran is a town in Warrumbungle Shire that sits on the divide between the Central West and North West Slopes regions of New South Wales, Australia. At the 2016 census, the town had a population of 2,537, Material was copied from this s ...

, Tamworth, and Walcha to

Port Macquarie Port Macquarie is a coastal town in the local government area of Port Macquarie-Hastings. It is located on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales, Australia, about north of Sydney, and south of Brisbane. The town is located on the Tasman Sea co ...

, on the coast of the

Tasman Sea The Tasman Sea (Māori: ''Te Tai-o-Rēhua'', ) is a marginal sea of the South Pacific Ocean, situated between Australia and New Zealand. It measures about across and about from north to south. The sea was named after the Dutch explorer Abe ...

. It was named to commemorate

John Oxley John Joseph William Molesworth Oxley (1784 – 25 May 1828) was an explorer and surveyor of Australia in the early period of British colonisation. He served as Surveyor General of New South Wales and is perhaps best known for his two exp ...

, the first European to explore much of inland

in 1818.

Route

Oxley Highway starts from

Mitchell Highway Mitchell Highway is an outback state highway located in the Central West Queensland, central and South West Queensland, south western regions of Queensland and the North West Slopes, northern and Central West, New South Wales, central western ...

at Nevertire and travels roughly east through

Warren A warren is a network of wild rodent or lagomorph, typically rabbit burrows. Domestic warrens are artificial, enclosed establishment of animal husbandry dedicated to the raising of rabbits for meat and fur. The term evolved from the medieval Angl ...

to Gilgandra, where it intersects with

Castlereagh Highway Castlereagh Highway is a state highway located in New South Wales and Queensland, Australia. The highway's northern terminus is at a junction with Carnarvon Highway, south of , Queensland. Its southern terminus is at a junction with Great West ...

. It shares a concurrency with

Newell Highway Newell Highway is a national highway in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. It provides the major road link between southeastern Queensland and Victoria via central NSW and as such carries large amounts of freight. At in length, the Newell is th ...

from there to Coonabarabran, where it splits off and heads east again through

Gunnedah Gunnedah is a town in north-eastern New South Wales, Australia and is the seat of the Gunnedah Shire local government area. In the the town recorded a population of 9,726. Gunnedah is situated within the Liverpool Plains, a fertile agricultur ...

to Tamworth, where it shares another concurrency with

New England Highway New England Highway is an long highway in Australia running from Yarraman, north of Toowoomba, Queensland at its northern end to Hexham at Newcastle, New South Wales at its southern end. It is part of Australia's National Highway system, an ...

from there to

Bendemeer Bendemeer () is a village of 485 people on the Macdonald River in the New England region of New South Wales, Australia. It is situated at the junction of the New England and Oxley Highways. Bendemeer is also famous for producing the number on ...

. It splits off again and heads east to intersect with

Thunderbolts Way Thunderbolts Way (and at its northern end as Bundarra Road) is a country road located in the Northern Tablelands region of New South Wales, Australia, linking Inverell via Bundarra, Uralla and Walcha to Gloucester The road is partially seal ...

at Walcha, continuing east through

Yarrowitch Yarrowitch is a small rural locality on the Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia. It is located in the picturesque Yarrowitch River Valley on the Oxley Highway 48 kilometres east of Walcha. The settlement is included in the W ...

, Ellenborough, Long Flat, Wauchope, and intersects with Pacific Highway just east of Wauchope, before eventually terminating at Port Macquarie. About 45 kilometres of the Yarrowitch to Wauchope section is unfenced and

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...

(cattle) may be encountered there, along with other wild animals on most of the highway.

Kangaroo Kangaroos are four marsupials from the family Macropodidae (macropods, meaning "large foot"). In common use the term is used to describe the largest species from this family, the red kangaroo, as well as the antilopine kangaroo, eastern gre ...

s are the most likely of those to be spotted, but

wombat Wombats are short-legged, muscular quadrupedal marsupials that are native to Australia. They are about in length with small, stubby tails and weigh between . All three of the extant species are members of the family Vombatidae. They are adap ...

s and other marsupials may be found.

History

Work commenced in 1838 with the use of convicts working from Port Macquarie towards a spot known as "Prisoners' Garden" about 20 km from Yarrowitch. Here it is said that the convicts were chained up each night. In 1842 the track from the

Northern Tablelands The Northern Tablelands, also known as the New England Tableland, is a plateau and a region of the Great Dividing Range in northern New South Wales, Australia. It includes the New England Range, the narrow highlands area of the New England regio ...

to Port Macquarie was opened for the first time.

Wool Wool is the textile fibre obtained from sheep and other mammals, especially goats, rabbits, and camelids. The term may also refer to inorganic materials, such as mineral wool and glass wool, that have properties similar to animal wool. As ...

carried along this new route reduced the travelling time to 10 days, as opposed to 12–14 weeks for the trip to

Maitland Maitland is an English and Scottish surname. It arrived in Britain after the Norman conquest of 1066. There are two theories about its source. It is either a nickname reference to "bad temper/disposition" (Old French, ''Maltalent''; Anglo Norm ...

. The section from Walcha to Bendemeer existed as a mapped road in 1857, was surveyed in 1867, and proclaimed a Parish Road in c.1889. West of Walcha the road was only suitable for bullock teams and they too had difficulties, especially with the ranges. The steep range section from Yarras to Yarrowitch was in serious need of repair in 1925 when the Main Roads Board was formed. Following a re-survey in 1927 the road was altered between Yarras and Tobins Camp. The passing of the ''Main Roads Act of 1924'' through the

Parliament of New South Wales The Parliament of New South Wales is a bicameral legislature in the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW), consisting of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly (lower house) and the New South Wales Legislative Council (upper house). Eac ...

provided for the declaration of Main Roads, roads partially funded by the State government through the Main Roads Board (later the Department of Main Roads, and eventually

Transport for NSW Transport for NSW, sometimes abbreviated to TfNSW, and pronounced as Transport for New South Wales, is an agency of the New South Wales Government established on 1 November 2011, and is the leading transport and roads agency in New South Wales, ...

). Oxley Highway was declared (as Main Road No. 11) on 8 August 1928, from the intersection with North Coast Highway (today Pacific Highway) near Wauchope, via Walcha, Tamworth, Gunnedah, Coonabarabran, and Gilgrandra to the intersection with North-Western Highway (today

) at

Trangie Trangie is a town in the Orana region of New South Wales, Australia. The town is on the Mitchell Highway north west of the state capital Sydney. It is part of Narromine Shire local government area. At the , Trangie had a population of 1,188. ...

; with the passing of the ''Main Roads (Amendment) Act of 1929'' to provide for additional declarations of State Highways and Trunk Roads, this was amended to State Highway 11 on 8 April 1929. On 30 September 1933 the section between Walcha and Port Macquarie was officially opened.

Walcha Shire Walcha Shire is a local government area located in the New England region of New South Wales, Australia. The Shire is situated adjacent to the junction of the Oxley Highway and Thunderbolts Way and is east of the Main North railway line passi ...

maintained 106 km of the Highway until July 1966 when this part was taken over by the Department of Main Roads. In 1951, the western end of the highway was rerouted through

to terminate at

. The passing of the ''Roads Act of 1993'' updated road classifications and the way they could be declared within New South Wales. Under this act, Oxley Highway today retains its declaration as Highway 11, from Nevertire to Gilgandra, from the intersection with

near Coonabarabran to Tamworth, and the intersection with

at Bendemeer to Port Macquarie. Oxley Highway was signed National Route 34 across its entire length in 1955. With the conversion to the newer alphanumeric system in 2013, this was replaced with route B56 between Coonabarabran and Port Macquarie, with the rest of the highway west of Coonabarabran unallocated.

Major intersections

Gallery

Oxley Hwy.JPG, Signs, Oxley Highway. Apsley Falls 7.JPG, The

Apsley Falls The Apsley Falls are two waterfalls on the Apsley River in the Northern Tablelands region of New South Wales, Australia. The falls are located about east of Walcha, and 1 kilometre off the Oxley Highway in a deep gorge, that is part of the Ox ...

are located adjacent to the Oxley Highway, near Walcha.

References

*Walcha – 100 Years of Local Government, Walcha Shire Council, Newprint Industries, Walcha, 1989.

External links