Charlestown

Charlestown is a suburb of Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia, and the largest town within the City of Lake Macquarie.

It is located approximately 10km’s west-southwest of the central business district of Newcastle.

Charlestown has the largest business centre within the Lake Macquarie city, with a greater turnover than that of the neighbouring Newcastle CBD. The suburb serves as the district’s transport hub.

Originally granted to the Waratah Coal Company, the area was the site of the company’s first shaft, sunk in 1873.

Officially called South Waratah, the pit was variously known as Charles’ Pit, Raspberry Gully or The Gully Pit. These names all applied to Charlestown in its early days and the surviving name seem to have been derived from that of Charles Smith, the company’s manager. The first settlers were miners from the pit.

The company had the area surveyed on 29 April 1876; the first subdivision later became Ida Street, Pearson Street, Milson Street and Frederick Streets. Harry Wright bought the first lot when it was auctioned later in 1876.

The town had its first water main in 1927 and was connected to civic sewage in 1959.

The size of Charlestown is approximately 7km². It has 42 parks covering nearly 14% of the total area. There are 9 schools and 7 childcare centre located in Charlestown.

The population of Charlestown in 2001 was 12,373 people.

By 2006 the population was 12,313 showing a stable population in the area during that time.

The predominant age group in Charlestown is 20 – 29 years.

Currently the median sale price of houses in the area is $489,000.

This information has been prepared on 23rd March 2011 and sourced from RPdata and Wikipedia.