Heritage Trail - Ruffey Lake Park - Doncaster

Photos of June 24 2019, mainly on the Heritage Trail, starting from the small car park at the end of Church Rd.

Info boards along the trail describe the history of the area, with photographs.
 

Ruffey Lake Park (locally Ruffeys) is a park in the City of Manningham. It is situated around Ruffey Lake in a portion of a valley through which the Ruffey Creek runs, forming the border between Doncaster and Templestowe. It has three main entrances, Victoria St, The Boulevard and King St. 

 

Despite being the second largest park in Manningham, second to Westerfolds Park, it is the biggest urban park managed by the City of Manningham. It is approximately 68 hectares (168 acres) in size. Formerly orchards, the park has a diverse ecology; this includes a riparian strip of native bushland around the creek, areas of pine trees planted by early settlers and pockets of fruit trees remaining from past orchards.

 

The park is named after Ruffey Creek, a watercourse that runs through the park which was dammed to irrigate the surrounding orchards, forming Ruffey Lake. During the summer, the park hosts the annual Manningham Carols by Candlelight.

After European settlement, the native bushland was cleared for orchards and in 1966 the then City of Doncaster and Templestowe Council purchased land for open space use. Ruffey Creek was dammed in the mid 90s creating Ruffey Lake. Today, the creek and lake serve as storm water drainage basins, rubbish dropped on the streets regularly flows down the creek and there are waste catchers deployed in the lake itself to catch some of this pollution.