Lonsdale is an

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 ...

south of

Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. The name "Adelaide" may refer to ei ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, within the

City of Onkaparinga The City of Onkaparinga () is a local government area (LGA) located on the southern fringe of Adelaide, South Australia. It is named after the Onkaparinga River, whose name comes from ''Ngangkiparinga'', a Kaurna word meaning women's river. It ...

. Lonsdale was farmed from shortly after European settlement until the 1950s, when the

South Australian Housing Trust The South Australian Housing Trust (SAHT) is an independent statutory authority originally established by the Government of South Australia responsible for providing low-cost rental housing to working people and their families, as a means of su ...

acquired much of the land for industrial use.

Mobil Mobil Oil Corporation, now known as just Mobil, is a petroleum brand owned and operated by American oil and gas corporation ExxonMobil, formerly known as Exxon, which took its current name after history of ExxonMobil#merger, it and Mobil merge ...

Port Stanvac Refinery Port Stanvac Refinery was an oil refinery in the Australian state of South Australia located in Lonsdale, a southern suburb of Adelaide. Its construction was announced in 1958 and began refining crude oil in 1963. It had a capacity of 3.3 mill ...

and

Chrysler FCA US, LLC, Trade name, doing business as Stellantis North America and known historically as Chrysler ( ), is one of the "Big Three (automobile manufacturers), Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn H ...

's engine foundry were followed by many other manufacturing and service industries. Subsequent suburban development of surrounding areas has driven demand for a wide range of service-oriented businesses in the area. Port Stanvac Refinery and the

Mitsubishi The is a group of autonomous Japanese multinational companies in a variety of industries. Founded by Yatarō Iwasaki in 1870, the Mitsubishi Group traces its origins to the Mitsubishi zaibatsu, a unified company that existed from 1870 to 194 ...

(formerly Chrysler) engine plant closed in 2004, with both sites remaining unused as of 2007. The South Australian Government announced plans to build a seawater

desalination plant Desalination is a process that removes mineral components from saline water. More generally, desalination is the removal of salts and minerals from a substance. One example is soil desalination. This is important for agriculture. It is possible ...

at the site in 2007, to provide fresh water for Adelaide. The Adelaide Desalination Plant opened in 2013. Lonsdale is served by

Lonsdale railway station Lonsdale railway station is located on the Seaford line. Situated in the southern Adelaide Adelaide ( , ; ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital and most populous city of South Australia, as well as the list of cities in Au ...

. Lonsdale has

SouthLink SouthLink is an Australian bus service operator in Adelaide. It operates services as part of the Adelaide Metro network under contract to the Department for Infrastructure & Transport. It is a subsidiary of Keolis Downer. History In April 20 ...

's largest southern bus depot.

History

Lonsdale was settled in the early 1840s in the movement of colonists into the Morphett Vale Region. One of its settlers had come from the English town of

Kirkby Lonsdale Kirkby Lonsdale () is a town and civil parish in the Westmorland and Furness district of Cumbria, England, on the River Lune. Historically in Westmorland, it lies south-east of Kendal on the A65. The parish recorded a population of 1,771 in ...

. A local farmer gave the name Lonsdale to his property and in time this name was given to a local rail siding and eventually the suburb. Farming continued in the area until the 1970s. The housing trust had purchased a large amount of land in the vicinity and portions of this were set aside for industrial use, with large firms like Chrysler and Sola Optical as well as the Port Stanvac Oil refinery moving in. Farming in the area had become unprofitable by the 1980s. The suburb was also known for being the origin of the name of the Lonsdale automobile marque of the Colt Car Company in the United Kingdom, the marque sold a

badge engineered In the automotive industry, rebadging (also known as badge engineering, an intentionally ironic misnomer in that little or no actual engineering takes place) is a form of market segmentation used by automobile manufacturers around the world. T ...

version of the Adelaide-assembled Mitsubishi Sigma (GJ)

References

External links

Map
Suburbs of Adelaide {{adelaide-geo-stub

History

See also

References

External links