It turns out that even in the 19th Century, the Northern Beaches had issues with public transport.
Public transport to the northern parts of the Peninsula has always been over promised and under delivered. Speculators have been caught out by this on several occasions.
Probably the best known is Brock’s Folly at Mona Vale. In 1888, the North Shore, Manly and Pittwater Tramway and Railway Act authorised two private individuals to construct a tramline from North Sydney to The Spit, and then to Manly, followed by a tramway to Newport.
In 1894, this inspired George Brock to build a magnificent 25 bedroom mansion – later known as La Corniche – at Mona Vale, complete with race course, polo grounds and a golf course for paying guests. The tram never came and neither did the patrons.
Thirty years later, a group of prominent businessmen floated a public company called Land Properties and Investments Ltd which bought 518 acres at Elanora Heights for subdivision. As newspapers at the time reported: “The basis for all this activity is the fact that population is rapidly flowing into the district – the effect (of) completion of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, and the concreting of the road from The Spit to Narrabeen – and further benefits anticipated from Dr Bradfield’s proposed new bridge, road and railway line over Middle Harbor to Manly and Narrabeen, plus other improvements to communications in the district. Attention is being turned to Warringah Shire as ‘Sydney’s Second City,’ for ‘Sydney’s Second Million,’ and to Elanora Heights as ‘The Bellevue Hill of Warringah’.”
Unfortunately for the investors, the grand public transport schemes never eventuated. The tramline did reach Narrabeen in 1913 but, until after World War Two, the transport reality north of Narrabeen was a small number of private buses running over a still primitive road network. Fortunately for us, ‘Sydney’s Second Million’ never arrived.
Richard Michell is the vice-president of the Manly, Warringah and Pittwater Historical Society and the secretary of Friends of Dee Why Lagoon. Visit mwphs.org.au and fodyl.au respectively.
