Wattle Grove is a suburb of

Perth Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

, Western Australia, located within the

City of Kalamunda The City of Kalamunda is a local government area in the eastern metropolitan region of the Western Australian capital city of Perth about east of Perth's central business district. The area covers , much of which is state forest rising into ...

Description

Wattle Grove is approximately 2/3 semi-rural, and 1/3 suburban development. It contains some of Hartfield Park, and extends from Crystal Brook Road to

Roe Highway Roe Highway is a limited-access highway and partial freeway in Perth, Western Australia, linking Kewdale with the city's north-eastern and south-western suburbs. The northern terminus is at Reid Highway and Great Northern Highway in Midd ...

. Major transport routes through the suburb are Welshpool Road, Hale Road,

Tonkin Highway Tonkin Highway is an north–south highway and partial freeway in Perth, Western Australia, linking Perth Airport and Kewdale, Western Australia, Kewdale with the city's north-eastern and south-eastern suburbs. As of April 2020, the northern ...

and Roe Highway.

Public transport

Bus

* 279

Kalamunda Bus Station Kalamunda bus station is a Transperth bus station located next to the Kalamunda Central shopping centre in Kalamunda, Western Australia. It has four stands and is served by eight Transperth routes operated by Path Transit and Swan Transit ...

to Maddington Central – serves Kelvin Road * 280 High Wycombe Station to Westfield Carousel – serves Hale Road * 281 Darling Range Sports College to Lesmurdie Senior High School – serves Hardey East Road, St John Road, Wimbridge Road, Arthur Road, Bruce Road and Welshpool Road * 282

Elizabeth Quay Bus Station Elizabeth Quay bus station, formerly the Esplanade Busport, is a Transperth bus station, located at the southern edge of the Perth (suburb), Perth CBD in Western Australia, next to the Perth Convention Exhibition Centre and Elizabeth Quay rail ...

– serves Welshpool Road * 283

– serves Crystal Brook Road and Welshpool Road

Facilities

Playgrounds are located throughout the new subdivisions in the suburb, as well as walking and bike paths leading to newly created artificial lakes. Wattle Grove is served by Wattle Grove Primary School, and a Community

TAFE Technical and further education or simply TAFE () is the common name in Australia for vocational education, as a subset of tertiary education. TAFE institutions provide a wide range of predominantly vocational courses. Colloquially also known ...

Centre in Lewis Road and the Bible College of Western Australia (private). The primary school built on the area bordered by St John Road, Tomah Road, and Acastus Road opened to students in 2011. The previous primary school on Welshpool Road was mothballed with no alternative usage envisioned. Hartfield Recreation Centre, located nearby, provides gymnasium facilities as well as opportunities for playing AFL football, rugby league, soccer, baseball, cricket and tennis. Hartfield Park also contains the Darling Range Horse and Pony Club, the Hartfield Country Club (golf course), boy scouts, and car club rooms. Wattle Grove is well connected to other regions of Perth due to its proximity to the Roe Highway and Tonkin Highway. The most direct route to the

Perth central business district Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

is via Welshpool and

Shepperton Road Shepperton Road is a single carriageway four lane road in Perth, Western Australia. Counterintuitively, the road provides a higher-capacity alternative for the northernmost section of Albany Highway due to the latter forming the high street ...

s (12 km all in 60 km/h zones), however alternative routes are available via Orrong Road /

Graham Farmer Freeway The Graham Farmer Freeway is a inner-city freeway in Perth, Western Australia. It links the Mitchell Freeway in West Perth to Great Eastern Highway and Orrong Road in Burswood, providing an east–west bypass of the Perth central business d ...

(14 km in 70 & 80 km/h zones), Tonkin Highway /

Great Eastern Highway Great Eastern Highway is a road that links the Western Australian capital of Perth with the city of Kalgoorlie. A key route for road vehicles accessing the eastern Wheatbelt (Western Australia), Wheatbelt and the Goldfields-Esperance, Goldfie ...

(18 km in 100 & 60 km/h zones), and Roe Highway /

Kwinana Freeway The Kwinana Freeway is a freeway in and beyond the southern suburbs of Perth, Western Australia, linking central Perth with Mandurah to the south. It is the central section of State Route 2, which continues north as Mitchell Freeway to A ...

(23 km all in 100 km/h zone and the only route without traffic lights). Wattle Grove has one major retail facility within its boundaries, containing

Aldi Aldi (German pronunciation: ), stylised as ALDI, is the common company brand name of two German multinational family-owned discount supermarket chains operating over 12,000 stores in 18 countries. The chain was founded by brothers Karl and ...

7-Eleven 7-Eleven, Inc. is an American convenience store chain, headquartered in Irving, Texas. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Seven-Eleven Japan, which in turn is owned by the retail holdings company Seven & I Holdings. The chain was founde ...

and various other stores e.g. a bakery, a sushi shop and a gym. It has two vets, a motel, a number of nurseries, landscape suppliers, agistment paddocks, boarding kennels and a bird, fish and reptile shop. The nearest police station is at Forrestfield, and public hospitals are available at

Bentley Bentley Motors Limited is a British designer, manufacturer and marketer of Luxury vehicle, luxury cars and Sport utility vehicle, SUVs. Headquartered in Crewe, England, the company was founded by W. O. Bentley (1888–1971) in 1919 in Crickle ...

and Kalamunda.

History

Prior to European settlement the Beeloo

Whadjuk Whadjuk or Wadjak, alternatively Witjari, are Noongar (Aboriginal Australian) people of the Western Australian region of the Perth bioregion of the Swan Coastal Plain. Name The ethnonym appears to derive from , the Whadjuk word for "no". Count ...

people occupied much of Wattle Grove. In 1827 the colonial botanist Charles Fraser and Captain James Stirling explored the region to evaluate its suitability for farming. Initially the area was used for forestry and orchards; fruit growing continues to be one of the major industries in Wattle Grove,

Bickley Bickley is a district and a local government electoral ward in South East London, within the London Borough of Bromley. It is located 10.4 miles (16.7 km) south east of Charing Cross, bordering Elmstead to the north, Chislehurst to the n ...

and Orange Grove today. This suburb name may have come from a property that was in the area around 1920, or the name may have come about in the early 1900s from wattle trees that lined Welshpool Road; the district was described by the European settlers as "where the groves of wattle are". Much of Wattle Grove has developed into other agricultural uses such as poultry farms, equestrian studs, agistment paddocks, horticultural nurseries, pet kennels, hobby farms and cattle breeders. Twenty residents of Wattle Grove were killed in action during World War One (1914–1918), five of whom were from the same family.

Notable people

* David Birnie, serial killer

Recent events

After a concerted campaign was lost during the 1980s by the Save our Foothills action group a quarter of the suburb bounded by Welshpool Road, Tonkin Highway and Roe Highway has been rezoned as "urban development" by what was then the Shire of Kalamunda and is known as "cell 9" in the Kalamunda Shire Plans. This area of Wattle Grove is now a hive of activity as land is subdivided and houses built. The price of land in cell 9 has subsequently risen exponentially since the first subdivision in 1999.

References

{{City of Kalamunda suburbs Suburbs of Perth, Western Australia Suburbs in the City of Kalamunda