Henry Halloran

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Henry Ferdinand Halloran had a major impact on the development of the NSW South Coast, especially in the Jervis Bay area.

Henry was a land speculator, real estate agent and surveyor.

He was born in Sydney in 1869. His great-grandfather has been transported to Australia, having been convicted of forgery. On arrival in Sydney, he was immediately given a Ticket-of-Leave by Governor Macquarie and he then helped to establish a school for ‘Classical, Mathematical and Commercial Education’ that later became Sydney Grammar School.

Henry attended Sydney Boys High School and Newington College, then qualified as a surveyor in 1890 and became a conveyancer and valuer. Two years later Halloran had established his own firm, Henry F. Halloran & Co., specializing in land and property dealings.

He actively subdivided large areas of land that he had previously acquired, especially along the NSW coast. These included parcels in Seaforth, Cronulla, Warriewood, Stanwell Park, Lake Macquarie, Avoca and various locations around Port Stephens.

But he is probably best remembered for subdivisions in three areas, none of which ended up resembling his dreams for the areas – ‘Port Stephens City’ which is now North Arm Cove at Port Stephens, ‘Pacific City’ and ‘St Vincent City’ around Jervis Bay, and ‘Environa’ near Canberra.

‘Port Stephens City’

In 1918 Walter Burley Griffin designed a large city-style subdivision on a peninsula of Port Stephens which, at the time, was being considered to become a major seaport for NSW.

In the early 1920’s, Halloran purchased large tracts of land throughout the Port Stephens area at North Arm and Pindimar, including the area that had attracted Burley Griffin’s attention. These he subdivided and offered for sale. His basic marketing strategy, which was later used elsewhere, was to emphasise that large profits could be expected in the future when economic development took place in the surrounding areas. It was suggested that a railway, naval base and significant commercial operations were likely to be established near Port Stephens City – none of which ever eventuated!

‘Pacific City’ and ‘St Vincent City’

Between 1915 and 1924, Halloran planned a series of ambitious subdivisions around Jervis Bay. The most notable were ‘Pacific City’, broadly encompassing the present-day towns of Vincentia, Hyams Beach and Sanctuary Point, and ‘St Vincent City’ on the north side of Jervis Bay. His interest in the area was sparked by Canberra being required to have a port, and the Jervis Bay area being selected to become part of the Australian Capital Territory. Halloran speculated (and promoted as fact) that a rail line linking Jervis Bay to the capital would turn the Jervis Bay area into a major centre of commerce and industry.

(A survey of a possible route for the Canberra to Jervis Bay railway was undertaken in May 1910. In 1912 the Minister for Home Affairs, King O'Malley, clearly indicated ‘Under the scheme for the establishment of the Federal Capital City it is not proposed to proceed with the construction of the Federal Port at Jervis Bay until after the completion of the (Capital) city … the construction of a harbour with the requisite docking accommodation and equipment, also of a railway solely for the purposes of the city in its earlier stages, cannot be entertained…In view of the expenditure to which the Commonwealth is committed in connection with defence, the transcontinental railway from Kalgoorlie to Port Augusta, the Federal Capital City etc, I am not prepared to advise any present expenditure.’ This didn’t stop Halloran showing possible railway routes on his maps, with branch lines into his estates. He even nominated sites for 21 railway stations to service his Pacific City and St Vincent City developments!)

Pacific City was marketed in 1915 – 1916. A 10-page brochure promoted the area as likely to become ‘the Southhampton of NSW’, welcome signs were erected, and a quarterly magazine the Pacific City Times was printed. Hundreds of people bought blocks over the following decade, but development never proceeded.

Pacific City, however, was not be Henry Halloran's only plan for Jervis Bay. St Vincent City (named for being in the County of St Vincent) was intended to be ‘the jewel in the crown’ when land within it was offered for sale from 1917. Its central business district was to be on the Beecroft Peninsula (on the site of the current Beecroft Weapons Range). A sprawling industrial suburb of Birmington was planned in the area south of Lake Wollumboola and it would be bisected by a canal that connected the Lake with the northern end of Jervis Bay, so that the Lake could become a major ship-building centre; and St Vincent's residential suburbs would sprawl from the northern shore of the Jervis Bay to the area that is now Crookhaven. Orient Point (marketed from 1917) and Culburra (marketed from 1922) were to become the first two (and only) St Vincent City suburbs; the unusual street layout in Culburra is today a legacy of Henry Halloran’s plans.

In the end, most of Halloran's plans for Pacific City and St Vincent City became little more than ‘paper subdivisions’. The railway to Canberra was never built, Jervis Bay never developed into a significant port, and the industry promised for the area never materialised. The government’s policy of decentralization at the time fell from fashion, and two World Wars and a Great Depression finally spelled the end to Halloran’s dreams for the development of Jervis Bay.

Then it’s down another Rabbit Hole…to ‘Environa’

One of the problems when researching history is that there are so many rabbit holes that you can go down, which often just absorb much of your time and often lead nowhere. But occasionally they do lead to something interesting, as occurred on this occasion.

Whilst researching Pacific City and St Vincent City, I came across mentions of ‘Environa’. This turned out to be another Henry Halloran subdivision that was being promoted on the outskirts of Canberra in the 1920s, and which was described as ‘a masterpiece of town planning on beautiful undulating land with far reaching views and overlooking the wonderful City of Canberra.’

In May 1925 Henry Halloran received approval from the Yarrowlumla Shire Council for a ‘Letchworth’ subdivision. It was on land that today is basically behind the Alexander Maconochie Correctional Centre, and was named after Letchworth Garden City in England. (Garden City designs were popular among town planners in the early 20th century.) It was never developed, but a small railway station called ‘Letchworth’ was built on the Queanbeyan to Cooma railway line and it operated from October 1926 to May 1956. It was demolished after the railway closed.

In 1924 Halloran bought a parcel of adjacent land at auction, and in April 1926 he received approval for its subdivision. ‘Environa’ was to be a grandiose subdivision - in fact, the most ambitious of Halloran’s many projects – of 1,700 lots that were designed to house a population of around 7,000. (It was grandiose indeed – Canberra only had a population of 2,000 at that time!) Halloran drew up the subdivision plans himself.

Environa was not in Canberra. It was just across the border in New South Wales. But its street names were distinctively ‘national capital’ names: ‘Parliament Boulevard’, ‘The Speaker’s Avenue’, ‘Opposition Radial’, ‘Hansard Road’, etc.. And the way the subdivision was laid out bore an uncanny resemblance to Walter Burley Griffin's sweeping circles and crescents designs for Canberra!

A number of bandstands, including one positioned on the highest point on the estate, were a feature of the development. These were envisaged to be performance venues for (popular?) groups like the Queanbeyan Volunteer Fire Brigade Brass Band.

The plan of the subdivision clearly stated it was ‘right on the boundary but not within the Federal Territory. Environa is absolute Freehold (Torrens Title) and free from the onerous restrictions applicable to the Commonwealth Leasehold Titles’, but this did not stop questions about it being raised in the Commonwealth Parliament and in the British House of Commons, and one Federal Minister who was connected with Halloran’s company being forced to resign.

Some development of the subdivision occurred, including the erection of a 12-metre high column that was surmounted by a bust of Sir Henry Parkes. Halloran had found the bust, the work of an Italian sculptor, in a Sydney second-hand shop; a similar bust is on display in the council chambers in Parkes, NSW. And the main topmast from the cruiser HMAS Sydney, that sank the German raider Emden in 1914, was actually erected in the central part of what might have become the city of Environa. However, it eventually rotted at the base and collapsed. It is now (appropriately, because of Halloran’s links to the Jervis Bay area) on display at the Jervis Bay Maritime Museum.

Despite being widely promoted both in Australia and England, no sales ever eventuated. The subdivision simply became a casualty of the slow development of Canberra and of the Great Depression - and yet another of Halloran’s many ‘paper subdivisions’.

Some of the land to the north was resumed by Queanbeyan Council because of unpaid rates, and later became part of South Queanbeyan. The rest has remained largely undeveloped because of concerns that any housing might be adversely affected by aircraft noise should Canberra Airport be expanded.

Henry Halloran worked (albeit on less ambitious projects) until the day when he died, on a bus on his way to work, in October 1953. He was 84 years of age.

He did not live to see significant sections of the land in his Pacific City and St Vincent City developments resold in the 1950s and 1960s for the erection of holiday homes, or ‘weekenders’ – certainly not the use to which he had envisaged much of his subdivided land would be used for!