top of the cross
The intersection of Victoria Street and Darlinghurst Road, early 60s.
In the centre is the old Kings Cross Theatre, demolished for the highrise Carlton Crest Hotel a few years after this photo. A little to the left is the Kings Cross Hotel (the taller one), now a nightclub complex. The rows of buildings along the left made way for the King Cross tunnel, and those on the right went down at the same time, making way for the highrise Kingsgate Hotel.
The Philips sign (top right) is sitting atop the Mayfair Hotel, and the Coke sign later, famously, got on steroids - (all photos enlarge)
Below, a closer shot, early 50s, though the 'after' version is taken a couple of floors lower given that the building from which the original was taken (the white one in the first photo above) no longer exists.
The tram has swung out of Bayswater Road on the right and is making the dogleg into William Street (Look, no lane markers). This route was the main arterial for city access from the northern Eastern Suburbs, and one day traffic pressures would become too great ...
And so the Kings Cross Tunnel had to be built. Below is 1940s William Street, heading into the city at top. Bottom right is Bayswater Road, with Victoria Street and Darlinghurst Road cutting a giant X through the centre of the pic - which, incidentally, is where the Cross comes from in Kings Cross (though until 1905 it used to be called Queens Cross, but, in a seemly interval after Queen Victoria's death, was changed due to confusion with Queens Square in town. As you would.)
Same geographic location in Google Earth today. A great swathe of the area went down for the tunnel around 1971. It starts just under the pink arrow, which is where I took the 'after' shots above and which shows their direction. For non-Sydneysiders, the black blobs are shadows from modern 30-40 storey apartment blocks (1 Horizon [a vacant block in the old pic, later ABC Radio], 2 Kingsgate, 3 Elan). The railway on the right went through a few years after the tunnel, and so the burgeoning East became connected to the city, at the cost of just a few hundred terrace houses and flats.
In the centre is the old Kings Cross Theatre, demolished for the highrise Carlton Crest Hotel a few years after this photo. A little to the left is the Kings Cross Hotel (the taller one), now a nightclub complex. The rows of buildings along the left made way for the King Cross tunnel, and those on the right went down at the same time, making way for the highrise Kingsgate Hotel.
The Philips sign (top right) is sitting atop the Mayfair Hotel, and the Coke sign later, famously, got on steroids - (all photos enlarge)
Below, a closer shot, early 50s, though the 'after' version is taken a couple of floors lower given that the building from which the original was taken (the white one in the first photo above) no longer exists.The tram has swung out of Bayswater Road on the right and is making the dogleg into William Street (Look, no lane markers). This route was the main arterial for city access from the northern Eastern Suburbs, and one day traffic pressures would become too great ...
And so the Kings Cross Tunnel had to be built. Below is 1940s William Street, heading into the city at top. Bottom right is Bayswater Road, with Victoria Street and Darlinghurst Road cutting a giant X through the centre of the pic - which, incidentally, is where the Cross comes from in Kings Cross (though until 1905 it used to be called Queens Cross, but, in a seemly interval after Queen Victoria's death, was changed due to confusion with Queens Square in town. As you would.)
Same geographic location in Google Earth today. A great swathe of the area went down for the tunnel around 1971. It starts just under the pink arrow, which is where I took the 'after' shots above and which shows their direction. For non-Sydneysiders, the black blobs are shadows from modern 30-40 storey apartment blocks (1 Horizon [a vacant block in the old pic, later ABC Radio], 2 Kingsgate, 3 Elan). The railway on the right went through a few years after the tunnel, and so the burgeoning East became connected to the city, at the cost of just a few hundred terrace houses and flats.
Thankyou for creating this concise history of the X.
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