Whalan is a

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

, in the state of

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

. Whalan is located 45 kilometres west of the

Sydney central business district The Sydney central business district (CBD) is the historical and main Central business district, commercial centre of Sydney. The CBD is Sydney's city centre, or Sydney City, and the two terms are used interchangeably. Colloquially, the CBD or ...

, in the

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 federated state, state, province, division (politica ...

of the

City of Blacktown Blacktown City Council is a Local government in Australia, local government area in Western Sydney, situated on the Cumberland Plain, approximately west of the Sydney central business district, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Esta ...

and is part of the

Greater Western Sydney Greater Western Sydney (GWS) is a large region of the metropolitan area of Greater Sydney, New South Wales (NSW), Australia that generally embraces the north-west, south-west, central-west, far western and the Blue Mountains sub-regions with ...

region.

History

Whalan takes its name from James Whalan, who was granted at

Mount Druitt Mount Druitt is a suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located west of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Blacktown, and is part of the Greater Western Sydney regio ...

by Governor

Ralph Darling General Sir Ralph Darling, GCH (1772 – 2 April 1858) was a British Army officer who served as Governor of New South Wales from 1825 to 1831. His period of governorship was unpopular, with Darling being broadly regarded as a tyrant. He introd ...

in 1831. His father was Sergeant Charles Whalan who was Governor

Lachlan Macquarie Major-general (United Kingdom), Major General Lachlan Macquarie, Companion of the Order of the Bath, CB (; ; 31 January 1762 – 1 July 1824) was a British Army officer and colonial administrator from Scotland. Macquarie served as the fifth Gove ...

's orderly sergeant and in charge of the Light Horse Guard. James Whalan explored the areas around

Jenolan Caves The Jenolan Caves (Tharawal language, Tharawal: ''Binoomea'', ''Bindo'', ''Binda'') are limestone cave, limestone caves located within the Jenolan Karst Conservation Reserve in the Central Tablelands region, west of the Blue Mountains (New Sout ...

and the Blue Mountains and discovered the rock formation known as Grand Arch pursuing the bushranger McKeown.

Demographics

According to the 2021 census, there were 5,929 people in Whalan. * 51.5% of people were female, and 48.5% of people were male. * Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 11.0% of the population. * The most common ancestries were

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

26.6%,

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

22.7%,

Australian Aboriginal Aboriginal Australians are the various indigenous peoples of the Mainland Australia, Australian mainland and many of its islands, excluding the ethnically distinct people of the Torres Strait Islands. Humans first migrated to Australia (co ...

10.2%,

Samoan Samoan may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the Samoan Islands, an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean ** Something of, from, or related to Samoa, a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands ** Something of, from, ...

6.4%, and Filipino 4.9%. * 61.2% of people were born in

. The next-most common countries of birth were

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

3.7%,

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

3.5%,

Samoa Samoa, officially the Independent State of Samoa and known until 1997 as Western Samoa, is an island country in Polynesia, part of Oceania, in the South Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main islands (Savai'i and Upolu), two smaller, inhabited ...

2.4%,

Fiji Fiji, officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists of an archipelago of more than 330 islands—of which about ...

1.8% and

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

1.1%. * 61.2% of people spoke only English at home. 33.5% of people spoke a non-English language at home. Some of the other languages spoken at home included

4.1%,

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

3.7%,

Tagalog Tagalog may refer to: Language * Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines ** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language ** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language * Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Tagal ...

2.1%,

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

1.9%, and Tongan 1.8%. * The most common responses for religion were No Religion 27.0%,

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

21.4%, Not Stated 11.4%, and

Anglican Anglicanism, also known as Episcopalianism in some countries, is a Western Christianity, Western Christian tradition which developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the ...

10.5%, and

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

8.1%. * The most common occupations included Machinery Operators and Drivers 22.4%, Labourers 14.6%, Clerical and Administrative Workers 14.3%, Technicians and Trades Workers 11.5%, Community and Personal Service Workers 11.2%, Sales Workers 9.0%, Professionals 8.5%, and Managers 5.9%.

Parks & Recreation

Whalan has an extensive reserve that is made up of four soccer fields and four football fields. It also has numerous parks and a large go-cart track that is available to use every Saturday. As well there are numerous smaller parks and reserves dotted around the leafy suburb including RAAF Park on the eastern boundary. This park is a memorial to the RAAF camp that was on the site during WW2. There was also an airfield nearby with the runway still in existence as the main road access to Whalan Reserve. The old Mt Druitt motor racing track used to run along this runway and parts of Luxford Road and Kuringai Ave prior to the NSW Housing Commission developing the area in the mid-1960s.

Schools

Whalan has three public schools: Whalan Public, Madang Public and the special needs school, Halinda. Whalan High School was closed in 1999 following a reorganisation of several high schools in the area. In 2000, it briefly reopened as

Chifley College Chifley can refer to: * Ben Chifley (1885–1951), Prime Minister of Australia from 1945 to 1949 * Elizabeth Chifley (1886–1962), wife of Ben Chifley * Chifley, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra named after him * Chifley, New S ...

Senior campus before closing permanently two years later. The school's operations were moved to a new site in

while the old site sat vacant for several years. In 2015, the NSW state government allotted $20 Million towards the construction of a new Aboriginal Centre for Excellence. The existing buildings were retained while upgrades and new fittings were added. The new facility was delivered in 2018, with Halinda, Kimberwalli, and

PCYC Police & Community Youth Clubs (PCYC) or Police and Community Youth Clubs is a network of Australian non-profit, community organisations, founded in New South Wales. In some states such as NSW, they are constituted as an Incorporated Association. ...

using its facilities.https://kimberwalli.com.au/

References

{{Sydney Blacktown suburbs Suburbs of Sydney City of Blacktown