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Broadmeadows Area More Than Doubled Following 1915 Merger Decision
Boundary adjustments and population counts tracked through successive local government changes show how the district grew from a small road board to a city.
How we reported this
Broadmeadows residents saw their local government area more than double in size when the Shire of Merriang merged into the Shire of Broadmeadows in 1915, with the change taking effect the following year.
That merger stands out among several local government decisions that altered boundaries and tracked population shifts over the decades. The changes set the footprint that later became the City of Broadmeadows, and they still shape how the area is understood today in community records and planning discussions.
Early district setup and first counts
The Broadmeadows Road District began in 1857 with three parishes and covered a strip ten miles long by four to six miles wide. At that time the population sat under two thousand, with half the residents living in the townships of Broadmeadows and Campbellfield. By 1927 the police sub-district count had fallen to around one thousand three hundred before climbing back to two thousand in 1938.
Those early figures came from the same local government records that later documented further adjustments. In 1938 the federal government took ninety-four acres from the shire for Essendon Aerodrome expansion, trimming the southern edge near Bulla Road. The loss reduced the shire’s holdings while the overall population count remained steady at two thousand.
1950s separation and city status
Further boundary work in 1955 split the northern and southern sections of the shire, moving the new northern line to Somerton Road and transferring Greenvale, Yuroke and Mickleham to neighbouring shires. The remaining area received city status on 13 June 1956 when the Governor of Victoria opened the new town hall.
Residents can review the full sequence of dates and measurements on the Broadmeadows Museum timeline at broadmeadowsmuseum.org.au/local-history/timeline to see how each local government step connected to the next. Checking the original parish maps and population notes there gives a clear picture of the numbers that guided those past decisions.