History
Further information: History of MelbourneMelbourne's central grid patterned layout, known as the Hoddle grid, was first laid out in 1837. From the 1870s to 1920s, the central part of Melbourne was home to mostly medical professionals who had established practices along Collins Street and Spring Street and before the 1960s, only a handful of permanent residents lived in the Spring Street area and St Kilda Road. The area was largely unpopular for residents and Council policies did not permit development of apartment style housing in the area.
St Kilda Road was annexed in the 1960s and given the postcode of Melbourne 3004 to stimulate office development along the strip and reduce pressure on overdevelopment of the Hoddle Grid. The result was the demolition of many of the street's grand mansions.
Things changed somewhat due to the Kennett government's Postcode 3000 planning policy in the 1990s, which provided incentives for living in the central area.
Although the city centre now includes St Kilda Road, it competes for office space with Southbank, Docklands and the major outer suburban centres such as Box Hill, Glen Waverley, Ringwood, Ferntree Gully and increasingly South Yarra.
Read more about this topic: Melbourne City Centre
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“If man is reduced to being nothing but a character in history, he has no other choice but to subside into the sound and fury of a completely irrational history or to endow history with the form of human reason.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“History has neither the venerableness of antiquity, nor the freshness of the modern. It does as if it would go to the beginning of things, which natural history might with reason assume to do; but consider the Universal History, and then tell us,—when did burdock and plantain sprout first?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“When the history of guilt is written, parents who refuse their children money will be right up there in the Top Ten.”
—Erma Brombeck (20th century)