HISTORICAL
The
Belgrave Reservoir was constructed on the Monbulk Creek about 1893 to supply
water to Dandenong, and a storage basin was put in south of Wellington Road,
near the junction of Bergins and Police Roads.
Just
south of the basin a smaller "sedimentation dam", was commissioned on February 1914, to improve water quality, fed from
the main storage reservoir by a 5" pipe. This was on
the edge of the Police Paddocks and was 530 ft by 348 ft.
The smaller dam site is
now in private property just outside the western perimeter fence of the National Park, and can be viewed from the firebreak
track which starts at Army Rd. The dam has run-off water lying in it and is mainly overgrown with weeds, vegetation, and
trees. The remains of an old wooden platform is at the western end - this was associated with the original outlet pipe.
A
pipeline from the sedimentation dam connected the two storages to Dandenong;
part of this ran through Police Paddocks as an open channel.
The scheme was decommissioned in the late 1930s, but the pipeline
water was made available to dairy farmers In the Lysterfield area until about 1946.
Heany Park
Following decommissioning in 1949, the
main basin and surrounds were retained for swimming and recreation, and known as Heany Park. In 1957, the property ceased
to be used for public purposes and was made available to Scout groups. The sedimentation basin was located
adjacent to modern Reservoir Crescent. next to the Churchill National Park boundary.
Heights
Survey data collected during 1914 showed these altitudes
(above sea level) for key locations:
Note:
In 1914, it had been proposed that a new, larger Service Reservoir could be built at a lower level
on the Police Paddocks land, to augment the existing dam, but this was abandoned.
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See, also, the separate Chapter in this project devoted to Heany Park - a link is at the Navigation Panel on each
page.
