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Plan of Darling Harbour, showing the proclaimed resumption, [drawn by] E. Le Bihan, [Sydney]: Town and Country Journal, 19001900

by Le Bihan, E.

As part of the response to the bubonic plague outbreak in 1900, the New South Wales government enacted the Darling Harbour Wharves Resumption Act 1900 (Act No.10, 1900) which enabled resumption of land from Circular Quay to Darling Harbour. Approximately 900 houses were bought as well as the surrounding wharves, bond stores, factories, workshops, offices and pubs. According to the act, the area was 'resumed for the purpose of carrying out a system of public wharves and approaches thereto at Darling Harbour, and the waters at Port Jackson adjacent thereto..'

An article in the 12 May edition of the Town and Country Journal, revealed that it cost the Government £2,000,000 to carry out these resumptions. The resumptions encompassed the western side of Sussex street, along Kent street, down the hill and around Miller's Point until Dawes Point.