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Alexandra Fountain

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Alexandra Fountain, Charing Cross, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia
Alexandra Fountain, Charing Cross, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia

Alexandra Fountain is a fountain in the Australian city of Bendigo, Victoria. It is regarded as one of the city's most prominent landmarks and monuments.The fountain is located in Bendigo's Charing Cross area at the intersection of View Street and Pall Mall. Charing Cross effectively stands at the centre of the city and is one of Bendigo's busiest and most prominent intersections. The fountain stands opposite the main entrance of Rosalind Park. Alexandra Fountain was funded from the proceeds of the Bendigo Juvenile Industrial Exhibition (1879), a £500 gift from George Lansell and a further £700 from the Sandhurst City Council (now the City of Greater Bendigo). The fountain was designed by William Vahland (1828–1915), a local architect responsible for some of the city's most prominent buildings. The fountain was named in honour of Alexandra, Princess of Wales. Its grand opening on 5 July 1881 was attended by her sons Prince Albert and Prince George.Other than the Exhibition Fountain, built in 1880 and located in the Melbourne's Carlton Gardens, the Alexandra Fountain is the largest and most ornate municipal fountain in Victoria. The fountain stands 28 feet (8.5 m) high and sits in a 50 feet (15 m) diameter circular pool which itself is 2 feet (0.61 m) deep. It is made from 20 tonnes (22 tons) of Harcourt granite, cast iron and painted stone. Decoratively the fountain includes lion head spouts, four allegorical female figures, spouted bronzed mer-horses and dolphins, medallions of seashells, dolphins and tridents also decorate the fountain. The pool is bordered by a decorative cast-iron fence and lit with four cast-iron lamps.Historically the fountain is a monument to the success of the goldfields and the Bendigo region. Aesthetically the fountain is fairly typical of late Victorian monumental design but is unusual in that few fountains were built according to this theme.In 2017, a AU$350,000 refurbishment project was undertaken. The restoration project included repairs and repainting of the balustrade and masonry, including repainting and re-rendering the plaster work as well as plumbing and electrical work.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Alexandra Fountain (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Alexandra Fountain
View Street, Bendigo

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Latitude Longitude
N -36.75961 ° E 144.27828 °
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Alexandra Fountain

View Street
3550 Bendigo (Bendigo)
Victoria, Australia
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Alexandra Fountain, Charing Cross, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia
Alexandra Fountain, Charing Cross, Bendigo, Victoria, Australia
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Bendigo Post Office
Bendigo Post Office

The Bendigo Post Office is a building on Pall Mall in Bendigo, a provincial city in the Australian state of Victoria. The post office backs onto and is partly surrounded by Rosalind Park. The building was built between 1883 and 1887 by the contractors McCulloch and McAlpine and designed by Public Works architect George W. Watson in the Second Empire architectural style. The building shares a great deal with its neighbouring building, the Bendigo Law Courts, and had the same builder and designer and was built at around the same time. Notable features of the building include its 43-metre-high (141 ft) clock tower (housing a five-bell carillon) and the elaborate facades on all four sides of building. The building was extensively restored between 1978 and 1987. The building was used as a post office until 1997. It is currently used as Bendigo Tourism's Visitor Information Centre and won Victorian Tourism Awards in 2009 and 2010. It was further inducted into Victorian Tourism's hall of fame in 2011. It was also awarded a tourism award by Qantas in 2010, in the category of Visitor Information and Services. Bendigo Tourism describes the Information Centre as "Australia's Grandest Visitor Centre". The Centre boasts a large information area, an adjoining First Nations Gallery - Djaa Djuwima - and a Living Arts Space, which showcases some of the region's best artists. The building has been included on the Victorian Heritage Register as being of "architectural, historic, and aesthetic significance to Victoria".

Rosalind Park
Rosalind Park

Rosalind Park is an Australian park in Bendigo, Victoria. Prior to white settlement, a grassy woodland surrounded what is now called Bendigo Creek. At that time the creek was little more than a chain of pools and billabongs. The area would have been an important source of food and water for the indigenous Dja Dja Wrung people living in dry central Victoria.In the 1850s gold was discovered in the area, radically transforming the area that is now Rosalind Park. Bendigo was one of the richest gold mining regions in the world, with more gold found in the region from 1850 to 1900 than anywhere else in the world. At present it remains the seventh richest goldfield in the world. Puddling mills, shafts and piles of mine wastes and cast offs dominated the landscape. In 1852 the area was officially designated a Government Camp precinct, the bounds of which still roughly designate the park today. The Government Camp area comprised 66 acres and contained police barracks, gaol and lock-up, the former courthouse, a gold office and other government buildings, offices and quarters.In 1856 the local gold commissioner, Joseph Panton, first suggested that the camp should be turned into a park, but it was not until 1861 that 59 acres were formally reserved for the park and handed over to the Sandhurst Borough Council (now the City of Greater Bendigo). The first park gardener was appointed in 1870 and established the basic layout of Rosalind Park which remains to this day.