Hampton, Victoria

Hampton is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Its Local Government Area is the City of Bayside. It is located 14km south of Melbourne CBD, on the eastern shore of Port Phillip Bay. Its population is 11,200. Hampton is located in a wealthy area of Melbourne, wedged between the suburbs of Brighton and Sandringham. Like many of the surrounding suburbs, Hampton has experienced a boom in property values over the past two decades, and has become considered a desirable suburb to live. As a result, Hampton has a vibrant shopping centre along the main road, Hampton Street, boasting many cafes, restaurants and fashionable shops.

Sports

The major football club in Hampton is the Hampton Rovers Football Club who complete in the Victorian Amateur Football Association and MSJFL with a total of 22 teams. The major cricket club in the suburb is the Hampton Cricket Club which has teams in both turf and synthetic competitions. The club has both senior and junior teams and will celebrate its centenary in 2007/08.

History

Hampton, like Brighton, started off as a place of market gardens in the 1840s and 1850s, supplying fruits and vegetables for Melbourne. In the 1850s, interest started to grow in the beaches in the area as places for daytrips and holidays for Melbourners, particularly Picnic Point, near the current location of Hampton. This expanded when a railway line was built to Brighton Beach in the 1860s. In 1887, the railway line was extended to Sandringham, with a station servicing Picnic Point. It was called Retreat, after the Retreat Hotel at the Point. However, several landmarks in the area, including the beach, had been named Hampton, after a local market gardener Dyas Hampton, and as wealthy landowners began buying subdivided land in the area, they favoured the name Hampton as it sounded more regal. The name was set when the station was renamed Hampton. The population continued to grow at the start of the new century, with war commission homes being built for returned soldiers, notably around the Castlefield area, where Haileybury College was built. Rapid development occurred in the 1930s when the market gardens were subdivided, and today Hampton is well and truly part of Melbourne's suburban sprawl. The railway station still remains, though not the original building.

References

External links

• Hampton, Victoria is at coordinates 37°56′13″S 145°00′32″E / -37.937, 145.009Coordinates: 37°56′13″S 145°00′32″E / -37.937, 145.009