PORT AUGUSTA SA SOUTH AUSTRALIA Past and Present

Port Augusta (post code: 5700) (32°29′S, 137°46′E) is the fifth most populous city in South Australia after Adelaide, Mount Gambier, Whyalla and Murray Bridge. It is a seaport located on the east coast of the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia and is located at the head of the Spencer Gulf, 322 km north of the state capital. It is natural harbour which was settled on 24 May 1852 by Alexander Elder and John Grainger. The port was named after Augusta Sophia, Lady Young, the wife of the Governor of South Australia, Sir Henry Edward Fox Young. According to the 2006 Census the population of the Port Augusta census area was 13,257 people, making it the second largest urban area after Whyalla on the Eyre Peninsula. In 1878, the town became the southern terminus of a proposed North South transcontinental line, headed for Darwin 2,500 km away. This 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) narrow gauge railway was later taken over by the Commonwealth in 1910 and later renamed the Central Australia Railway. In 1929 it was extended to its last terminus at Alice Springs, Northern Territory. Between 1913 and 1917, a 2,000 km long east–west transcontinental railway (the Trans-Australian Railway) was built from Port Augusta to Kalgoorlie in Western Australia. This was built to standard gauge as part of a long term plan to harmonise gauges between the mainland states, causing a break-of-gauge at Port Augusta until it was extended to Port Pirie in 1937. The standard gauge Adelaide-Darwin railway was finally...