Dover Heights, New South Wales

Dover Heights is a coastal, eastern suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Dover Heights is located 9 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of Waverley Council. The postcode is 2030.

Location

Dover Heights borders Vaucluse to its north, North Bondi to its south and Rose Bay to its west and has the Pacific Ocean to its east.

Dover Heights is a mainly residential suburb. Many of the suburb's properties have views of Sydney Harbour and the Sydney Harbour Bridge, making its Dudley Page Reserve a popular site for tourist buses. Some properties have both harbour and ocean views.

The suburb is considered to be the most affluent within the Waverly Local Government Area, , and amongst the most affluent suburbs in Sydney. This is reflected in property prices - like nearby suburbs Vaucluse and Bellevue Hill, median house prices are above AUD $2 million.

The main road of Dover Heights is Military Rd.

Transport

Public transport is available through Sydney Buses routes 333, 380.

History

Dover Heights is believed to have been named for its cliffs along the Pacific Ocean which resembled those found at Dover, in Kent, England. The first mention of Dover Heights appeared in municipal records in 1886. The area was first used for market gardens.

In 1830 land in the area was owned by Daniel Cooper (1785-1853), a partner in the firm Cooper and Levey, who owned the Waterloo Stores. The retailing emporium was located on the corner of George Street and Market Street in the city, on the site that was later occupied by Gowings Brothers retailers until 2006. The Dover Heights area was subdivided in 1913.

Radar station

During the Second World War, Rodney Reserve, at the Dover Heights clifftop, was used by the Royal Australian Air Force for coastal defence RADAR. The CSIRO further used the site for pioneering experimentation in radio astronomy related to galactic radio emissions, with a team including John Gatenby Bolton first observing solar emissions in 1945. The site primarily made use of Yagi antennae.

References

• The Book of Sydney Suburbs, Compiled by Frances Pollen, Angus & Robertson Publishers, 1990, Published in Australia ISBN 0-207-14495-8

Further reading

• Bolton, J. "Radio astronomy at Dover Heights," Proceedings of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 4, 349-358 (1982).
• CSIRO, " Radio astronomy at Dover Heights"
• Orchiston, W. & B. Slee, "Ingenuity and Inititative in Australian Radio Astronomy: The Dover Heights ‘Hole-in-the-Ground’ Antenna," Jour. Astron. History & Heritage 5, 21-34 (2002).
• Stanley, G. J., "Recollections of John G. Bolton at Dover-Heights and Caltech," Australian Journal of Physics 47, 507-16 (1994).
• Wild, J.P. & V.R. Radhakrishnan, " Heights John Gatenby Bolton 1922-1993," Historical Records of Australian Science 10-4, 381-391 (1995).

External links