In search of the New Mystic Lake Estate. Part One
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| Original brochure Front |
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| Original brochure Plan |
Bayswater was booming and The Basin area was becoming a popular spot for
holiday seekers wishing to escape the heat and smell of a bustling Melbourne
city as well as being the home of some very wealthy industrialists and
entrepreneurs.
Imagine then, that these influences meant taking the line from Bayswater
up the Mountain Highway to Forest Road and then following Forest Road down
towards the Quarry and onto Upper Ferntree Gully. Bypassing the open fields and
sparsely populated area that was Boronia but still servicing Ferntree Gully
township.
Imagine again. Just to humour me, If this deviation happened and the
boom that exploded Boronia’s growth,
instead took place in the quiet leafy Basin area.
Maybe, just maybe some of those many unrealized housing estates that
were planned during the period of the post-first World War years through to the
1950s may have actually taken place and the road to Sassafras wouldn’t be tree
after tree cutting through a National Park but driveways, front yard gardens
and letterboxes.
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| The Age April 1952 |
The Basin’s development is indeed littered with failed, scaled-down and unrealized housing developments and subdivisions. From the failed Ferndale development that resulted from the tragic death of the Griffith Family in 1925 to the scaled-down Schneider estate that was planned without reviewing the site or the terrain and packed 640 lots on what now comfortable holds little more than half that.
Then there’s the New Mystic Lake Estate situated on the south side
of Mountain highway opposite Inverness Avenue. Planned in the early 1950s this
estate offered wonderful views in a bush setting and was heavily advertised in
newspapers both mainstream and regional as well as radio. Attracting interest
both local and from afar, that was until they saw what they had to build on.
Though some sites were bought sight unseen from the plan, the plan didn’t show
how unsuitable the majority of lots were due to their steep incline, being
rocky, or having a creek running through them. Ultimately the development was a
flop, and in the 1960s the Government restricted any further
development in the estate and began progressively buying back properties, demolishing
any buildings, and incorporating the land into the Ferntree Gully National
Park, which in itself was incorporated into the Dandenong Ranges National Park
in 1987.
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| Remains of old stairs of the property opposite Inverness Ave. |
Despite this, eight properties were built or settled upon and one still remains on the gentler north side of the Highway. So, with this in mind, I decided I had to check this out. Another hidden treasure that this area keeps revealing every time I take a little closer look around the place that I call home.
On entering the former
estate via Alamein Track (formerly Alamein Avenue) you get a sense that this
could have been a grand entrance the way the road has been cut into the
hillside, you also notice it’s on a very dangerous blind bend and crossing here
is be taken with caution and quick feet. The road these days has been gated for
emergency vehicles only but cyclists and hikers are more than welcome and of
course, because it is a National Park, no dogs.
The track is in excellent
condition and bears no resemblance to a normal fire access road. The road is
well laid and flat with not a tyre track rut to be seen, I’m assuming from when
the estate was first established. The track is remarkably flat with the north side
falling rather steeply and the Southside being less severe. Making any evidence
of its existence impossible from the main road below. The main entrance is definitely
the way to go. I tried to climb up the slope about a hundred metres down the
road because it was closer to the car but gave up after about five minutes when
it dawned on me that if I broke a leg here, I’d be a skeleton before they found
me and inadvertently end up as a murder mystery.
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| Alamein track |
Alamein Track makes up one of two entrances to the New Mystic Lakes estate from Mountain Highway, the other Tobruk Avenue (now track) is the other- which we will discuss later. The other road of any significance is Government Road, which starts as a track but then becomes a proper sealed road as it mergers further towards the township into the old Schneider estate mentioned earlier and Old Forest Road. The only other is Cleve Road, now also a track.
Alamein Ave is just short of 800 metres long and a pleasant walk. While
I was there, I passed a couple of locals going for an afternoon ramble. There
are some points along the track where the vista is breathtakingly beautiful,
exposing you to views as far as the city on the horizon and upward to the old
transmission towers. You could understand why some people decided to make this
their home, however on my visit proof that anyone ever lived here was not as
obvious or easy to find.
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| Evidence of tiered garden beds |
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| simple retaining wall |
That is until you look that little bit closer. Driveways and property entrances are all but grown over these days but a look up the hill shows what seems to be garden terraces made with rocks, and on closer inspection, flat graded areas are evident, the odd plant that really shouldn’t be growing in a National Park is also a bit of a give away that someone once tended a garden here though no structure exists.
On my return back down it occurred to me that today's building and
engineering practices could easily develop this road and the north side of the
hill, for proof just look at the Ferntree Gully quarry or anywhere in
Warrandyte, luckily for us that will never happen thanks to the incorporating
into the National Park.
Now it was time to venture further up the road and higher on the hill to
Tobruk Avenue and talk some more of the estate’s history and hopefully, find some
old ruins.
To be continued next month.
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| Promotional map with detail. |
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| 1966 Melway map of area |
Rick Coxhill’s history of the Basin and the Trove newspaper website.
www.coxhill.com www.trove.nla.gov.au
