NSWRail & telegraph
Wyong
A railway yard built for timber became the northern lakes’ town centre.
1887Railway station opens
WHAT STARTED IT
Charles Alison laid out a private township beside Wyong Creek in the mid-1880s and opened a sawmill there. When the Sydney–Newcastle railway arrived, Wyong station was given a large yard for the district’s heavy timber trade.
WHAT SUSTAINED IT
Around 1900 the district’s timber-getters were cutting railway sleepers by the million, and from about 1912 wharves on the river linked trains with launches to the Tuggerah Lakes resorts. Wyong became the seat of the new Wyong Shire in 1947.
TURNING POINTS
1887Wyong station opens on 15 August, with a large yard laid out for timber traffic.
1889The Hawkesbury River bridge completes the Sydney–Newcastle line through Wyong.
1903Albert Warner buys most of the remaining private land at Wyong and subdivides it.
1947Wyong Shire is proclaimed, with its administrative centre in Wyong.
1983A bypass takes Pacific Highway traffic out of the town centre.
WHAT IT DOES NOW
A compact town centre and one of the two administrative centres of Central Coast Council, with the courthouse, a TAFE campus and Wyong Racecourse. The railway is still its main link, with trains to Sydney and Newcastle.