Laverton 3028 Laverton 3028

Laverton, a residential and industrial suburb east of Hoppers Crossing and Werribee, is 18 km. west-south-west of Melbourne. It was named after the Laverton pastoral run, settled by Alfred Langhorne in 1836.

In 1886 Staples Wise and Co. promoted the sale of land in the "new and model suburb"of Laverton on behalf of the Federal Investment Company of Australasia. The Laverton railway station was the first one beyond Newport on the line to Geelong. A primary school was opened by the Wesleyan Church on land donated by Staples Wise and Co. in 1887.

In 1914 the Australian Military Forces aviation corps was formed at Point Cook. Eleven years later the Royal Australian Air Force (1921) established an Aircraft Depot at Laverton, seven kilometres to the north of Point Cook. Its first commander was Lieutenant-Colonel R. Williams, and the Laverton Air Base was later named the RAAF Williams Laverton Base. It is served by a separate railway station, "Aircraft", near its entrance.

During the 1950s a Housing Commission estate was established at Laverton. A second primary school was opened in 1955 following the construction of married quarters at the "Cabbage Patch"on the RAAF Base. By 1966 there were over 900 pupils at the school. Two more primary schools were opened in 1967 and 1969, and a high school was opened in 1967.

Laverton has a shopping centre near the railway station and a drive-in centre with a council library to the south, across the Princes Freeway. There are parks with sports facilities on Skeleton Creek and on Laverton Creek. The western two-thirds of the Air Base is proposed for housing and urban redevelopment (1997).

The area north of Laverton previously comprised part of Derrimut, but is now known as Laverton North. In 1919 the State Government set aside part of Laverton North as a site for noxious trades, and in 1922 it was reserved as a site for a metropolitan cattle sale yards. By 1980 the proximity of residential settlement made the reservations inappropriate, and transport depots, warehouses and an industrial estate have superseded them.

In 1987 the median house price in Laverton was 74% of the median for metropolitan Melbourne and in 1996 it was 63% of the metropolitan median.

Laverton's census populations have been 156 (1891), 411 (1933), 390 + 525 RAAF Base (1947), and 4,346 (1961).

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