Station Names on Melbourne's City Loop

Hi there, today I want to bring to you the first of a multipart series that will featured on this blog.

To make good use of my time in the great indoors I decided to do some research, finding out where the names of every railway station in Melbourne comes from. This included figuring out where the names of certain suburbs came from, because as one may already know, there are stations in Melbourne that are actually named after the suburb they're located in (I know, it's shocking).

The first part of this series will cover the stations located in the City Loop, who's working name is the Melbourne Underground Rail Loop, (Credit to Redditor Bugisman3 for making me remember that Wikipedia is a thing). This will be a short introduction before we get to the more interesting bits. This introduction will include the origins of the former names given to Flinders Street, Southern Cross, and Melbourne Central, as well origin of the name provided to the now closed station of Princes Bridge.

Pictured above: City Loop featured on the PTV's Victorian Train Network

Now before we get to the meat of this subject, we should probably talk about the origin of the name Melbourne.

Melbourne name origin

The city of Melbourne is named after a British Prime Minister. To be specific, it's named after William Lamb, aka Lord Melbourne. The man who suggested the name, Richard Bourke, inspired the name for Melbourne's iconic Bourke Street. 

But enough about the city of Melbourne, let us talk about the City Loop Stations

The origins of the City Loop

So let us get into the main course shall we?

Flinders Street

Starting off we have Flinders Street, a name of completely mysterious origin, but I managed to find out where it comes from.

The station known as Flinders Street appears to be named after a street, also named Flinders Street!

Google Streetview of Flinders Street (the station) and Flinders Street (the street).

This street is located on the northern edge of the station, and is named after explorer Matthew Flinders, some of you may recognize the name because of the Matthew Flinders Hotel located in Chadstone.

Before we move on to the next station, it is important to talk about the original name given to Flinders Street, which was 'Melbourne Terminus' according to Jenny Davis in her book Beyond the Facade: Flinders Street, More than Just a Railway Station. The name 'Melbourne Terminus' makes sense when considering that it was the terminus of Melbourne's first railway line, which was the Port Melbourne Line.

Now, let us move on.

Southern Cross

This name comes from the star constellation of the same name. This star constellation is named Southern Cross because it forms the shape of a cross and is viewable in the Southern Hemisphere. The constellation is featured on the Australian national flag.

The Australian Flag, note the Southern Cross constellation featured on the right.

The name Southern Cross replaced Spencer Street in 2005, much to the dismay of people such as these folks on Railpage.

Speaking of Spencer Street, that name comes from the street of the same name located on the eastern edge of the station. Spencer street is named after John Spencer, who was Lord Melbourne's former chancellor.

Another name given to Southern Cross was 'Batman's Hill', which is named a hill that no longer exists, and was named after pioneer of Melbourne John Batman.

Flagstaff

This one is pretty simple really. Flagstaff is named after the nearby Flagstaff Gardens, located to the north of La Trobe Street and the station. Flagstaff Gardens is named after a flagstaff that was erected in the area, originally intended for people to communicate between the city and the bay.

Google Street view showing an entrance to Flagstaff Station, with Flagstaff Gardens in the background.

Melbourne Central

Melbourne Central is another simple one. Melbourne Central is actually named after the shopping centre located above the station.


Some older readers of this blog may know that Melbourne Central once had a different name. Prior to 1997, the station was known as 'Museum', named as such because it was close to the former location of Melbourne Museum. The former location was where the Keith Murdoch building now stands (Credit to a Reddit user with an inappropriate name).

Parliament

You know what Parliament Station is next to? Parliament House. Is that where the name comes from? Probably.

Honestly I do not have much to say about this one. Only other thing I have is that a parliament is a group of owls, make of that what you will.

Pretend there is an image of a parliament of owls here

Princes Bridge

To finish off this blog, I have one other station to mention, Princes Bridge. Princes Bridge is a station named after a bridge that carries St Kilda Road over the Yarra River. Princes Bridge was incorporated into Flinders Street in the 1980s, with Platform 14 being the only remains of Princes Bridge that still exists. Federation Square is now where Princes Bridge once stood.


That is it!

Yeah, that is all for part one of this multiple part series surrounding the origins of the various names given to Melbourne's train stations. Tune to the next blog, which will cover the Williamstown line! Make sure to give me feedback to help my blog improve! Also make sure to subscribe to email notifications and share this blog to people who you think may be interested in this sort of stuff!

Edit on 11/08/20: Refined a few things.

Location: Melbourne VIC, Australia

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