Camberwell MMTB depot
160-170 Camberwell Road and 12-14 Council Street HAWTHORN EAST, BOROONDARA CITY
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Statement of Significance
HO497 Camberwell MMTB depot
What is Significant
The key elements of the Camberwell MMTB Depot are the tram shed and administration building. The more significant feature of the shed is the north wall and the decorated return wall to a depth of approximately 8 metres along Redfern Street. The remaining extent of west wall on Redfern Street and the south wall on Risson Lane are of less importance. The administration building is significant to the extent of the complete original external fabric.
How is it Significant
Camberwell MMTB Depot is historically and aesthetically significant to the City of Boroondara.
Why is it Significant
The tram shed is a prominent and dramatic streetscape element in its own right. It is an important reminder of the significance of the tramway system along major east-west and north-south Junction roads and the importance of public transport to suburban development. (R Elphinstone, Camberwell Junction Heritage Study, 1991). Linked with and integral to the history and operation of the depot, the administration building is a distinctive example of Neo-Georgian design as applied in a public works context. It is a building which reinforces the importance of the tram system in the growth of suburban Melbourne and in the local area.
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Camberwell MMTB depot - Physical Conditions
Tram shed
The Camberwell tram shed is a double-height red face brick building in English bond, with clinker brick window sills, lintels and mullions, brick rustication marking out bays, cement rendered parapet and frieze. It probably has a mezzanine component at the rear or west end. It has an asphalt apron for its tram sidings, and an original fence up to the Council Street corner. The tubular steel overhead wiring poles appear original, though their floodlight fittings are later, as does the fence around the siding yard at the Council Street end, which comprises red brick piers, cement rendered caps and steel mesh webbing in an iron tube frame. Some windows and doors in the tram shed have been bricked in or relocated, on the Redfern Road and Risson Lane sides, to the northwest and southwest, but these are out of the main road streetscape view.
The building has a series of brick breakfronts capped with cement rendered frieze and parapet, proclaiming MMTB (Melbourne and Metropolitan Tramways Board) in two projecting bays at each end of the Camberwell Road elevation. These are each stepped out from the main parapet by about 10cm. At their lower levels these breakfronts are delineated by brick rustication at their edges suggesting quoins, and each has a three-light window to Camberwell Road. Intermediate bays enclose a single window each, and are divided by brick piers, again rusticated at their edges. All the Camberwell Road windows are framed with clinker brick, distinguishing them from the more general red brick on the rest of the exposed brick surfacing. These support the cement-rendered frieze above, but with no alteration to the frieze depth or the consistent parapet height. The east end of the tram shed is open and surmounted by a set of trusses supporting a saw-tooth roof with its opaque slopes facing northwest and its glazed walls facing southeast. The east front wall of this saw-tooth is enclosed in corrugated galvanised steel sheets and a set of floodlights are installed on this wall, corresponding to the number of tram sidings entering the shed. Five vents are mounted above the front edge of each saw-tooth bay. Each siding could accommodate five or six trams of conventional length under this main roof, and the interior is subdivided into mezzanine and other office and storage spaces toward its northwest (Redfern Road) and southwest (Risson Lane) end. Toilets are on the south-west side to the rear, facing Risson Lane, and escape stairs there indicate office, store or other rooms at first floor level. The Camberwell Road-Redfern Road corner is chamfered, giving the building a touch of art deco massing redolent of Wallis, Gilbert and Associates' Hoover factory in London. Several brick courses nearer the Camberwell Road footpath are battered out from the main northeast wall.
Administration building
The administration building (former Staff and Dispatch office) is a double storey Neo-Georgian building of red faced brick with slate tiled roof, apsidal north end and textured stucco Roman Doric columns, supporting a central balcony. The west elevation has two breakfront wings with rusticated brick corners indicating quoins, twin gables with open bases and two semicircular panels suggesting Serlian windows on the first floor. A colonnaded tholos porch is at the north end, rounding the corner between the main tram siding apron and Risson Lane.
Heritage Study and Grading
Boroondara - Camberwell Junction Heritage Study
Author: Lovell Chen
Year: 2012
Grading:
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