OWEN ANCHORAGE RAILWAY

Statement of Significance

The railway opened up the industrial area south of Fremantle and stimulated local employment.

History

Owen Anchorage Railway was built c.1900 to service the area to the south of Fremantle. It terminated at Robb Jetty at Owen Anchorage. The railway line originally followed the original shoreline down the coast, but when the Esplanade Reserve was developed in 1902/03 through reclamation of South Bay, the line was pulled up and re-laid along the new shoreline.

The railway line mainly served the meat processing plants at Robb Jetty and the industries along the South Fremantle coast, with several having spur lines coming up to platforms at the back of the premises.

Owen Anchorage had long been associated with the slaughtering of animals for human consumption. In the early 1850s, John Wellard slaughtered sheep for the Convict Establishment in this area. Later, Copley & Co processed sheep and cattle on the same spot. Further south, in 1900 Robb Jetty was built to offload cattle from ships from the North West. The slaughter houses of Forrest, Emanuel & Co, and Connor, Doherty & Durack just about monopolised the supply of meat to the metropolitan area and the Goldfields.

Although Robb Jetty was burnt down in the 1960s, and road trains have replaced the ships that bought the cattle down from the North West, the area remained a centre for meat processing. A large freight terminal was built in there in 1972. Cattle continued to be processed by WA Meat Export Works (est. 1921), Anchorage Butchers and Watsons Foods. The abattoirs were closed in 1993.

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Historic Themes

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This data is provided by the City of Fremantle. While every care is taken to ensure the accuracy of this data, the City of Fremantle makes no representations or warranties about its accuracy, reliability, completeness or suitability for any particular purpose and disclaims all responsibility and all liability (including without limitation, liability in negligence) for all expenses, losses, damages (including indirect or consequential damage) and costs which you might incur as a result of the data being inaccurate or incomplete in any way and for any reason. Under no circumstances should this data be used to carry out any work without first contacting the City of Fremantle for the appropriate confirmation and approval.