Port Phillip Arcade, Melbourne

Melbourne ( (listen) MEL-bərn) (Boonwurrung: Naarm) is the capital and most-populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a 9,993 km2 (3,858 sq mi) metropolitan area known as Greater Melbourne, comprising an urban agglomeration of 31 local municipalities, although the name is also used specifically for the local municipality of City of Melbourne based around its central business area. The city occupies much of the northern and eastern coastlines of Port Phillip Bay and spreads into the Mornington Peninsula and the hinterlands towards the Yarra Valley and the Dandenong and Macedon Ranges. It has a population over 5-million (19% of the population of Australia, as per 2020), mostly residing to the east side of the city centre, and its inhabitants are commonly referred to as "Melburnians".The area of Melbourne has been home to Aboriginal peoples for over 40,000 years and serves as an important meeting place for local Kulin nation clans. Of the five peoples of the Kulin nation, the traditional owners of the land encompassing Melbourne are the Boonwurrung and the Wurundjeri peoples. The name Naarm is commonly used by the broader Aboriginal community to refer to the city, stemming from the traditional Boonwurrung name for Port Phillip Bay.A short-lived penal settlement was built at Port Phillip, then part of the British colony of New South Wales, in 1803, but it was not until 1835, with the arrival of free settlers from Van Diemen's Land (modern-day Tasmania), that Melbourne was founded. It was incorporated as a Crown settlement in 1837, and named after the then British Prime Minister, William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne. In 1851, four years after Queen Victoria declared it a city, Melbourne became the capital of the new colony of Victoria. During the 1850s Victorian gold rush, the city entered a lengthy boom period that, by the late 1880s, had transformed it into one of the world's largest and wealthiest metropolises. After the federation of Australia in 1901, it served as the interim seat of government of the new nation until Canberra became the permanent capital in 1927. Today, it is a leading financial centre in the Asia-Pacific region and ranks 23rd globally in the 2021 Global Financial Centres Index.Melbourne is home to many of Australia's best-known landmarks, such as the Melbourne Cricket Ground, the National Gallery of Victoria and the World Heritage-listed Royal Exhibition Building. Noted for its cultural heritage, the city gave rise to Australian rules football, Australian impressionism and Australian cinema, and has more recently been recognised as a UNESCO City of Literature and a global centre for street art, live music and theatre. It hosts major annual international events, such as the Australian Grand Prix and the Australian Open, and also hosted the 1956 Summer Olympics and the 2006 Commonwealth Games, and will host the 2026 Commonwealth Games, along with a number of regional areas of Victoria. It was host to the 1880 World's Fair. Melbourne consistently ranked as the world's most liveable city for much of the 2010s.Melbourne Airport, also known as the Tullamarine Airport, is the second-busiest airport in Australia, and the Port of Melbourne is the nation's busiest seaport. Its main metropolitan rail terminus is Flinders Street station and its main regional rail and road coach terminus is Southern Cross station. It also has Australia's most extensive freeway network and the largest urban tram network in the world.

Melbourne Province was an electorate of the Victorian Legislative Council (Australia).Melbourne Province was created in 1882 when Central Province was abolished in the redistribution of Provinces. Its area included central Melbourne, Carlton, Fawkner Park and Richmond.William Hearn and James Lorimer transferred from Central to Melbourne Province that year.In 1904, another redistribution occurred and Melbourne East Province, Melbourne North Province, Melbourne South Province, Melbourne West Province were created. The number of members representing Melbourne Province were reduced from four to two that year.Melbourne Province was abolished at the 2006 state election in the wake of the Bracks Labor government's reform of the Legislative Council.

The Electoral district of Town of Melbourne (later known as Electoral district of City of Melbourne) was an electorate of the New South Wales Legislative Council before it became part of the Colony of Victoria on 1 July 1851.

The Nicholas Building is a landmark historic office and retail building located at 37 Swanston St, at the intersection of Swanston Street and Flinders Lane, in the central business district of Melbourne, Australia. Designed by architect Harry Norris and completed in 1926, it is the grandest example in Melbourne of what is known as the 'Chicago School' or 'Commercial Palazzo' style, featuring large scale classical elements. It has long housed a range of small businesses, and is now known for its creative industry tenants such as fashion designers and artists and specialist retailers. It had the longest operating manual lifts in the city, and the ground floor Cathedral Arcade is one of the most notable arcades in the city. While the building structure itself is protected, it does not prevent the change of its use. The building was placed on the market in June 2021. This has led the Nicholas Building Association to campaign to raise funds in order to rescue the current use of the building as a creative hub from commercial development. As a result, some artists in the community have raised awareness that the lack of protection for the use of buildings can have adverse effects in protecting heritage:"However, usage is rarely safeguarded - heritage protection is mainly concerned about the look of a building. And mainly concerned about how it looks from the street. Interiors are mostly disregarded unless there's some aspect about it that has gathered some public fame. In other words, heritage protection is superficial at best and fairly ineffective in protecting what is worth protecting. Safeguarding a city entails much more than protecting the 'decorative' features of a façade."

Cathedral Arcade is a heritage shopping arcade in Melbourne, Victoria. It forms a short, narrow laneway, connecting Swanston Street to Flinders Lane in the central business district of Melbourne. It is a T-shaped arcade, however one of the laneways terminates inside the building. The arcade is notable as it retains all of its original features. The arcade is fully covered by stained glass and leadlights, which forms a highly detailed arch leading to a central dome. The floors are decorated with ceramic tiles, and the shopfronts feature richly detailed wood panels. The art deco arcade, which dates back to 1925, is part of the Nicholas Building, an early interwar palazzo skyscraper designed by Harry Norris. The building itself, including the arcade is listed on the Victorian Heritage Register.

Flinders Street railway station is located on the corner of Flinders and Swanston streets in the central business district (CBD) of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Opened in 1854, the historic station serves the entire metropolitan rail network, as well as some country services to eastern Victoria. Backing onto the Yarra River in the heart of the city, the complex includes platforms and structures that stretch over more than two whole city blocks, from east of Swanston Street nearly to Market Street. Flinders Street is served by Metro's suburban services, and V/Line regional services to Gippsland. It is the busiest station on Melbourne's metropolitan network, with an average of 77,153 daily entries recorded in the 2017/18 fiscal year. It was the terminus of the first railway in Australia (the Port Melbourne line) and was reputedly the world's busiest passenger station in the 1920s, owing to the concentration of services there that was only rectified with the construction of the City Loop in the 1970s. Its main platform (operationally divided into platforms 1 and 14) is Australia's longest, and the fourth longest railway platform in the world. Flinders Street is responsible for two of Melbourne's busiest pedestrian crossings, both across Flinders Street, including one of Melbourne's few pedestrian scrambles. The station's current main building was completed in 1909 and is a cultural icon of Melbourne. The distinctive and eclectic Edwardian building, with its prominent dome, arched entrance, tower and clocks is one of the city's most recognisable landmarks, and its grand, somewhat exotic character led to the popular myth that the design was actually intended for Mumbai's Victoria Terminus and vice versa, but was swapped in the post.The Melbourne saying "I'll meet you under the clocks" refers to the row of indicator clocks above the main entrance, which show the next departure for each line; the alternative, "I'll meet you on the steps", refers to the wide staircase beneath the clocks. It has been listed on the Victorian Heritage Register since 1982.

St Paul's Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral in Melbourne, Australia. It is the cathedral church of the Diocese of Melbourne and the seat of the Archbishop of Melbourne, who is also the metropolitan archbishop of the Province of Victoria. The cathedral was designed by the English Gothic Revival architect William Butterfield and completed in 1891, except for the spires which were built to a different design from 1926 to 1932. It is one of Melbourne's major architectural landmarks.

The Anglican Diocese of Melbourne is the metropolitan diocese of the Province of Victoria in the Anglican Church of Australia. The diocese was founded from the Diocese of Australia by letters patent of 25 June 1847 and includes the cities of Melbourne and Geelong and also some more rural areas. The cathedral church is St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne. The current Archbishop of Melbourne since 2006 is Philip Freier, who was translated from the Anglican Diocese of The Northern Territory, and who was the Anglican Primate of Australia from 2014 to 2020.

The Empire Building was home to commercial, retail arcade with offices and showrooms over, in the city of Melbourne, Australia. It stands beside the Mutual Store building on the corner of Flinders and Degraves Streets, opposite Flinders Street station. The Empire Building and Mutual Store were redeveloped into a residential complex, completed in 2006.

The Majorca Building is a neo-Romanesque, eight-storey tall building in Melbourne, Australia, designed and constructed between 1928-30. Located at 258-260 Flinders Lane, it was designed by Harry Norris, one of the most prolific architects in the city during the 1920s and '30s. Norris's designs incorporated both emerging Australian and American architectural styles and the Majorca Building has been described as his best work incorporating faience.

Centre Place is a laneway and pedestrian precinct in Melbourne, Australia. It runs north from Flinders Lane to Collins Street, between Elizabeth Street and Swanston Street. The laneway is famous for its vibrant bars, cafes, restaurants and boutiques. It also features some of Melbourne's most well-known examples of street art and graffiti and the precinct has been used in tourism campaigns for the city.

The City Square was a public plaza located in the Central Business District (CBD) of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The site is currently bounded by Swanston Street, Collins Street, Flinders Lane and the Westin Hotel. The historic landmarks of Melbourne Town Hall and St Paul’s Cathedral are across the streets to the north and south respectively. The square has been redeveloped several times and associated with a number of controversies over the years. The square closed on 3 April 2017 in preparation for the construction of Town Hall railway station, and was demolished later that year.