Parramatta (; ) is a city and major commercial centre in Greater Western Sydney. It is located approximately west of the Sydney central business district on the banks of the Parramatta River. It is commonly regarded as the second CBD of metropolitan Sydney.
Parramatta is the municipal seat of the City of Parramatta local government area and is often regarded as one of the primary centres of the Greater Sydney metropolitan region, along with the Sydney CBD, Penrith, Campbelltown, and Liverpool. It has a long history as a second administrative centre in the metropolitan region, being host to a number of government departments, as well as state and federal courts.
Founded as a British settlement in 1788 (the same year as Sydney), it is the oldest inland European settlement in Australia and serves as the economic centre of Greater Western Sydney. Since 2000, state government agencies such as the New South Wales Police Force and Sydney Water have relocated to Parramatta from Central Sydney. The 151st meridian east runs directly through the suburb.
History Aboriginal Radiocarbon dating suggests human activity occurred in Parramatta from around 30,000 years ago. The Dharug people who lived in the area before European settlement regarded the area as rich in food from the river and forests. They named the area Baramada or Burramatta ('Parramatta') which means Eel ("Burra") Place ("matta"), with the resident Indigenous people being called the Burramattagal. Similar Darug words include Cabramatta (Grub place) and Wianamatta (Mother place). Other references are derived from the words of captain Watkin Tench, a white British man with a poor understanding of the Darug language, and are incorrect. To this day many eels and other sea creatures are attracted to nutrients that are concentrated where the saltwater of Port Jackson meets the freshwater of the Parramatta River. The Parramatta Eels rugby league club chose their symbol as a result of this phenomenon.
British colonisation Parramatta was established by the British in 1788, the same year as Sydney. As such, Parramatta is the second oldest city in Australia, being only 10 months younger than Sydney. The British colonists, who had arrived in January 1788 on the First Fleet at Sydney Cove, had only enough food to support themselves for a short time and the soil around Sydney Cove proved too poor to grow the amount of food that 1,000 convicts, soldiers and administrators needed to survive. During 1788, Governor Arthur Phillip had reconnoitred several places before choosing Parramatta as the most likely place for a successful large farm."Man of Honour – John Macarthur", Michael Duffy, Macmillan 2003, p. 81 ff Parramatta was the furthest navigable point inland on the Parramatta River (i.e. furthest from the thin, sandy coastal soil) and also the point at which the river became freshwater and therefore useful for farming.
On Sunday 2 November 1788, governor Phillip took a detachment of marines along with a surveyor and, in boats, made his way upriver to a location that he called The Crescent, a defensible hill curved round a river bend, now in Parramatta Park. The Burramattagal were rapidly displaced with notable residents Maugoran, Boorong and Baludarri being forced from their lands.
As a settlement developed, governor Phillip gave it the name "Rose Hill" after British politician George Rose. On 4 June 1791 Phillip changed the name of the township to Parramatta, approximating the term used by the local Aboriginal people. A neighbouring suburb acquired the name "Rose Hill", which today is spelt "Rosehill".
In an attempt to deal with the food crisis, Phillip in 1789 granted a convict named James Ruse the land of Experiment Farm at Parramatta on the condition that he develop a viable agriculture. There, Ruse became the first European to successfully grow grain in Australia. The Parramatta area was also the site of the pioneering of the Australian wool industry by John Macarthur's Elizabeth Farm in the 1790s. Philip Gidley King's account of his visit to Parramatta on 9 April 1790 is one of the earliest descriptions of the area. Walking four miles with Governor Phillip to Prospect, he saw undulating grassland interspersed with magnificent trees and a great number of kangaroos and emus.Flynn 1997, p 28
The Battle of Parramatta, a major battle of the Australian frontier wars, occurred in March 1797 where Eora leader Pemulwuy led a group of Bidjigal warriors, estimated to be at least 100, in an attack on the town of Parramatta. The local garrison withdrew to their barracks and Pemulwuy held the town until he was eventually shot and wounded. A year later, a government farm at Toongabbie was attacked by Pemulwuy, who challenged the New South Wales Corps to a fight.J Henniker Heaton, Australian Dictionary of Dates and Men of the Time, Sydney, 1873
Governor Arthur Phillip built a small house for himself on the hill of The Crescent. In 1799 this was replaced by a larger residence which was substantially improved by governor Lachlan Macquarie from 1815 to 1818 and has survived to the present day, making it the oldest surviving Government House anywhere in Australia. It was used as a retreat by governors until the 1850s, with governor Thomas Brisbane making it his principal home for a short period in the 1820s.
In 1803, another famous incident occurred in Parramatta, involving a convicted criminal named Joseph Samuel, originally from England. Samuel was convicted of murder and sentenced to death by hanging, but the rope broke. In the second attempt, the noose slipped off his neck. In the third attempt, the new rope broke. Governor Philip Gidley King was summoned and pardoned Samuel, as the incident appeared to him to be divine intervention.
In 1814, Macquarie opened a school for Aboriginal children at Parramatta as part of a policy of improving relations between Aboriginal and European communities. This school was later relocated to "Black Town".
In 1821-22, Parramatta Observatory was established by the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Thomas Brisbane. It was the first permanent astronomical observatory in Australia for cataloguing southern stars. It closed in 1847 and only the stone piers of its transit telescope remain.
Post-federation Parramatta was gazetted as a city on 19 November 1976, and later, a suburb on 10 June 1994.
On 20 December 2024, the first stage of the Parramatta Light Rail was completed.
Climate
Parramatta has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen climate classification: Cfa) with mild to cool, somewhat short winters and warm to usually hot summers, alongside moderate rainfall spread throughout the year.
Summer maximum temperatures are quite variable, often reaching above , on average 13.1 days in the summer season, and sometimes remaining in the low 20s, especially after a cold front or a sea breeze, such as the southerly buster. Northwesterlies can occasionally bring hot winds from the desert that can raise temperatures higher than mostly from November to February, and sometimes above in January severe heatwaves. The record highest temperature (since 1967) was on 4 January 2020. Parramatta is warmer than Sydney CBD in the summer due to the urban heat island effect and its inland location. In extreme cases though, it can be warmer than Sydney, especially when sea breezes do not penetrate inland on hot summer and spring days. For example, on 28 November 2009, the city reached , while Parramatta reached , almost higher. In the summer, Parramatta, among other places in western Sydney, can often be the hottest place in the world because of the Blue Mountains trapping hot air in the region, in addition to the UHI effect.
Rainfall is slightly higher during the first three months of the year because the anticlockwise-rotating subtropical high is to the south of the country, thereby allowing moist easterlies from the Tasman Sea to penetrate the city.Context statement for the Sydney Basin bioregion – Climate by Bioregional Assessments from the Australian Government. Retrieved 11 April 2021. The second half of the year tends to be drier (late winter/spring) since the subtropical high is to the north of the city, thus permitting dry westerlies from the interior to dominate. Drier winters are also owed to its position on the leeward side of the Great Dividing Range, which block westerly cold fronts (that are more common in late winter) and thus would become foehn winds, whereby allowing decent amount of sunny days and relatively low precipitation in that period.Sharples, J.J., McRae, R.H.D., Weber, R.O., Mills, G.A. (2009) Foehn-like winds and fire danger anomalies in southeastern Australia. Proceedings of the 18th IMACS World Congress and MODSIM09. 13–17 July, Cairns Thunderstorms are common in the months from early spring to early autumn, occasionally quite severe thunderstorms can occur. Snow is virtually unknown, having been recorded only in 1836 and 1896 Parrammatta gets 106.6 days of clear skies annually.
Depending on the wind direction, summer weather may be humid or dry, though the humidity is mostly in the comfortable range, with the late summer/autumn period having a higher average humidity than late winter/early spring.
Commercial area
Church Street is home to many shops and restaurants. The northern end of Church Street, close to Lennox Bridge, features al fresco dining with a diverse range of cuisines. Immediately south of the CBD Church Street is known across Sydney as 'Auto Alley' for the many car dealerships lining both sides of the street as far as the M4 Motorway.
Since 2000, Parramatta has seen the consolidation of its role as a government centre, with the relocation of agencies such as the New South Wales Police Force Headquarters and the Sydney Water Corporation from Sydney CBD. At the same time, major construction work occurred around the railway station with the expansion of Westfield Shoppingtown and the creation of a new transport interchange. The western part of the Parramatta CBD is known as the Parramatta Justice Precinct and houses the corporate headquarters of the Department of Communities and Justice. Other legal offices include the Children's Court of New South Wales and the Sydney West Trial Courts, Legal Aid Commission of NSW, Office of Trustee and Guardian (formerly the Office of the Protective Commissioner), NSW Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. Nearby on Marsden Street is the Parramatta Courthouse and the Drug Court of New South Wales. The Garfield Barwick Commonwealth Law Courts Building (named in honour of Sir Garfield Barwick), houses courts of the Federal Magistrates Court and the Family Court of Australia. The NSW Government has also announced plans to secure up to 45,000 m2 of new A-grade leased office space in Parramatta to relocate a further 4,000 workers from the Sydney CBD.
Parramatta Square (previously known as Civic Place) is a civic precinct located in the heart of the city, adjacent to Parramatta Town Hall. The Parramatta Square construction works included a redevelopment of the Parramatta Civic Centre, construction of a new culture and arts centre, and the construction of a new plaza. The designs of the first two projects, a 65-storey residential skyscraper and an office building were announced on 20 July 2012. Concerns from CASA about infringements into controlled airspace from the height of the residential tower resulted in 8 Parramatta Square being turned into a 55-story commercial building, rather than the originally proposed 65-storey residential tower. Parramatta Square became home to 3,000 National Australia Bank employees, relocated from the Sydney CBD. Other notable commercial tenants who have established a presence at Parramatta Square include Westpac, Endeavour Energy, KPMG and Deloitte.