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City Engineer and City Surveyor's Department I

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The item is licensed for use under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which is Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International. When using or sharing this material, attribution must be given to City of Sydney Archives. Full license details are available from Creative Commons. In some cases copyright may be held by the City of Sydney. In other cases copyright may be held by a third party and the material is licensed to the City of Sydney.

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City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865

Description

Unique IDAS-1042Start date9th February 1865Start date qualifierlater thanEnd date31st December 1865End date qualifiercircaFormatPlanDescriptionThe Trigonometrical Survey of the City of Sydney consists of one plan in 56 sheets showing the urban layout of Sydney in 1865. It encompasses the broader City area, extending from Pyrmont and Chippendale in the west to the eastern side of Darlinghurst, and from the harbour in the north to the southern boundary of Redfern. The scale is forty feet to one inch (1:480), and the sheets are labelled with an alpha-numeric identifiers. It shows property boundaries and building footprints, and the location of pipes for sewerage and water reticulation. The buildings are colour coded to indicate the type of building material used in construction: pink, for brick; beige, for stone; grey, for wood; and blue, for iron. The Survey also shows sewerage and water reticulation details, such as pipe diameter, type of material used, depth from surface, and date the pipes were laid or connected to existing systems. Sewerage pipes are represented by red lines, water pipes by blue lines. Other symbols show the location of fireplugs, fountains, and locks connected to the water reticulation system. Pencil annotations indicate the plan was used as a working copy until at least the 1880s. It was used to denote changes to the sewerage and water reticulation systems, changes to street names and alignments, changes to property boundaries, and to show newly constructed buildings.
Relationship legacy dataCREATED BY: City Engineer and City Surveyors Department I AG-0086 (01/10/1854 to 31/12/1865) RELATED TO: Sewerage services AY-45 (01/10/1854 to 01/01/1888) RELATED TO: Allocation and changes of street names and street numbers AY-51 (01/10/1854 to 01/01/1888) RELATED TO: Water supply AY-44 (01/10/1854 to 01/01/1888) RELATED TO: Drainage works and maintenance AY-101 (01/10/1854 to 01/01/1888) LanguageEnglish (eng)More informationThis plan appeared in the City of Sydney's 2017 exhibition "Our City - 175 Years in 175 Objects" - Item 63 - Building - Water - Trigonometrical Survey of the City of Sydney, 1865 (page 83 in exhibition catalogue)Archivist noteThis registration is based on work done for the State Records series NRS 9929.

Map

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block Y2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block Y1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block X2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block X1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block W2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block W1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block V2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block V1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block U2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block U1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block T1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block S2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block S1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block R1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block Q2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block Q1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block P1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block O2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block O1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block N2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block N1

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block M2

City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865: Block M1

Series

Drainage plans

Access

Public access statusOpen to public accessPublic access noteAccess Notes:Access is available (at the City of Sydney Archives and at State Records) through various formats of copies including a digital copy.
Restriction Category:

Identification and Arrangement

Source system ID1042System of arrangementAlphanumeric sheetsCopies1. B&W 35mm microfilm aperture cards
2. B&W print copies on tracing plastic, from microfilm.
3. Digital copies on CD-ROM (to be available on line later).

Disposal

Disposal statusArchived

Data Quality

Legacy dataRegistered by: Mark Stevens
Registered date: 25/03/2003
Amendments:
Last amendment date: None
Other Disposal Instruments:
Bridging aids:
System of arrangements: Alphanumeric sheets
Series control status:
Repository:
UpdatedDate: 28/08/2008
UpdatedUser: Aug 28 2008 1:05PM

BOS Series Description:
Description of the records:

The 1865 Trigonometrical Survey of the City of Sydney consists of one plan in 56 sheets, of the city area extending from Pyrmont and Chippendale in the west to the eastern side of Darlinghurst, and from the harbour in the north to the southern boundary of Redfern. The area covered by the Survey is approximately the area within the city boundary created in 1842. Section 152 extends the survey south of Cleveland Street to encompass the municipality of Redfern. This section may have been completed after the others.

The sheets are labelled with an alpha-numeric codes (eg F1, F2, GH1). The scale is forty feet to one inch (1:480).

The Survey shows the urban layout of Sydney in 1865. It shows property boundaries and building footprints, and the location of pipes for sewerage and water reticulation. The buildings are colour coded to indicate the type of building material used in construction: pink, for brick; beige, for stone; grey, for wood; and blue, for iron. Keys for the colours are located on some of the sheets.

The Survey also shows sewerage and water reticulation details, such as pipe diameter, type of material used, depth from surface, and date the pipes were laid or connected to existing systems. Sewerage pipes are represented by red lines, water pipes by blue lines. Other symbols show the location of fireplugs, fountains, and locks connected to the water reticulation system. These symbols are included in most of the keys used for coding building materials.

Digital copies:

The original records comprising this series are now held by the State Records Authority of New South Wales (records series NRS 9929). A digital copy (on CD-ROM) has been created as a joint City Archives - State Records project during 2002-2003 and access will normally be through this copy. Acess to the digital version of the Survey will be made available on-line in due course.

Administrative history:

During the summer period in the four years from 1849, water was rationed in the City of Sydney, and public criticism of the City Council’s inability to provide adequate water supplies resulted in a number of investigations carried out by both the Council and the Legislative Council. Following the recommendations of the Legislative Council’s second Select Committee, the City Council was abolished in October 1853 (until 1859) and three Commissioners were appointed to exercise it's functions (Fitzgerald, 'Sydney 1842-1992' pp 44-46).

The Survey was undertaken by the City Surveyor’s Department of the Council [as required by the Sydney Sewerage Act 1853 s5 - check this].

The Survey began with the taking of measurements in October 1854. The laying out and plotting of the construction lines of the streets, and the filling in of the interior commenced shortly after. The filling in of the Plan’s interior was contracted out to private surveyors. By May 1855 the portion of the city north of Hay Street was more complete because it was 'more immediately required for purposes connected with the Sewerage of the North division of the older part of the City' (NSCA CRS 26: 1855/442).

The plan completed in 1855-1856 is not the plan that now survives as this records series. In December 1864 the City Engineer, Edward Bell, reported to the Council's Finance Committee that the 1855-1856 plan (described as comprising 24 sheets each about six feet square) was out of date because of new building construction and old buildings being pulled down. He recommended a copy be taken off the original, at the same scale, and updated to show the current position, and also to show the water reticulation system (NSCA CRS 22/8, Report of 9 Feb 1865).

The report was endorsed by the Committee (9 February 1865). In July 1865 the City Council (which had been restored in 1859) received a letter of complaint about the actions of some surveyors when taking measurements (NSCA CRS 26: 1865/637), perhaps to do with the collection of updated details for adding into the new copy.

Pencil annotations indicate the plan was used as a working copy until at least the 1880s, to denote changes to the sewerage and water reticulation systems, changes to street names and alignments, changes to property boundaries, and to show newly constructed buildings.

The plan was transferred to the Metropolitan Water Sewerage & Drainage Board, presumably following creation of the Board in 1888 to take over functions from the City Council. It was transferred from the Board to the NSW State Archives in 1974.
Start Date qual: c.
Start Date: 01/01/1854
End Date qual: c.
End Date: 31/12/1865

Relationships

Collection175 Exhibition CollectionSource systemBusiness operation system (BOS); Archives investigatorCreating agenciesCity Engineer and City Surveyor's Department IRelated activitiesDrainage works and maintenanceWater supplyAllocation and changes of street names and street numbersSewerage services

Registration

Date registered5th December 2018Registered byData Migration UserRegistration statusApproved

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City of Sydney - Trigonometrical Survey, 1855-1865