Traralgon, VIC 3844

Traralgon is the largest town in Gippsland and has an economy based on manufacturing, service administration and retailing. The population grew by 9% between 2001 and 2006 to top 20,000 persons for the first time. The Loy Yan Open Cut and Power Station, south east of the town is one of Australia’s biggest engineering projects and represents half the viable reserves of coal in the Latrobe Valley.Compared to much of regional Victoria, the town has a sizeable ethnic community, with about 5% of the population speaking a language other than English.

History of Traralgon, VIC 3844

The Gippsland region was originally inhabited by the indigenous Gunai people for a period in excess of 2,000 years.

The area around Traralgon was first settled by Europeans in the 1840s soon after being explored by Count Pawe?? Strzelecki on his return from the Snowy Mountains where he named Australia’s highest peak, Mount Kosciuszko. Due to the Latrobe Valley having relatively high rainfall, the land is very fertile, and farming was quickly established. As with much of central and western Gippsland, this was mainly dairy farming.

The township was established in the early 1860s, the Post Office opening on 1 January 1861.

In 1877 the railway line from Melbourne was completed with a railway station at Traralgon giving the town a major economic boost.

Traralgon was part of the area administered by the Rosedale Roads Board, before the Shire of Traralgon was established in 1879. In the latter part of the 19th century the Shire grew strongly.

It was not until the 1930s however that Traralgon began to move away from a farming based economy. In 1936 Australian Paper Manufacturers established a paper mill at Maryvale, around from Traralgon.

In 1960 Traralgon’s most famous son Sir Macfarlane Burnet jointly won the Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine.

Through the 1950s residents and councillors fought to separate the urban areas of Traralgon from the Shire of Traralgon, which occurred in 1961 when Traralgon formed its own borough, the Borough of Traralgon. Traralgon was proclaimed a city in 1964. The City of Traralgon and Shire of Traralgon continued a separate existence until the Shire of Latrobe was created in 1994.

Further development resulted from the expansion of the power generation industry following World War II, particularly through the now defunct SEC. This included large expansions at Yallourn and Hazelwood Power Stations and the construction of the massive Loy Yang Power Station in the 1970s and 1980s.

An Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) information processing centre was established in the early 1990s, at the time employing around 400 people.

Completion of the Loy Yang power stations, extensive voluntary departures from the electricity industry and privatisation of the Victorian electricity industry in the early 1990s had devastating effects on the economy of the Latrobe Valley. Traralgon, with a more diversified economy, suffered to a lesser extent than the neighbouring towns of Morwell and Moe both of which relied almost exclusively on the power stations for their livelihood.

Traralgon grew strongly in the mid 2000s, with a figure of 2.7% making it the largest and fastest growing city in the Latrobe Valley.