Park Avenue

Park Avenue, a suburb of Rockhampton North, is two km north of central Rockhampton. The origin of the name is uncertain, although Queens Park on the northern shore of the Fitzroy River may have had a part in it. The Park Avenue housing estate (1924) came well after the name, and the local primary school (1901) carried the name at or soon after its opening.

Queens Park, where Moores Creek empties into the Fitzroy, was reserved as a botanic garden, but it became a refuge for homeless people. The reserve's role was an accepted part of the community and its last resident left Queens Park in 1970.

Soon after the sale of the Park Avenue housing estate the Catholic Church opened St Joseph's primary school (1929). An Anglican church was opened in 1942, but it was the postwar years when the suburb grew most. St Stanilaus College and the Marian Girls' School (1958, 1963) were combined as the Emmaus College (1983). The low-lying area along Moores Creek was land-filled and made into Rockhampton's second botanic garden (1976-88 construction period). It was named after Clifford Kershaw, Rockhampton Council's health inspector, who rid the Fitzroy River and its waterways of the water-hyacinth pest weed. The garden is a prime attraction reached by the second river crossing, the Neville Hewitt bridge (1980), which forms part of the Bruce Highway. The highway leads to Rockhampton Shopping Fair (Stockland) which opened in 1985. It has a discount department store, two supermarkets, over 110 other shops and several cinemas.

In early January 2011 water from the Fitzroy River backed up Moores Creek and flooded parts of the Botanic Gardens. On Park Avenue’s other boundary, Splitters Creek, flooding reached upstream to Thompson Street and Glenmore Road.

The census populations of Park Avenue have been: