O'Connell Street, North Adelaide

O'Connell Street is the main north–south route through North Adelaide, South Australia and is heavily-trafficked by north-suburban commuters to Adelaide city centre.[1] At its northern end it intersects with Barton Terrace West and the commencement of Prospect and Main North roads. At its southern end it abuts Brougham Gardens and intersects with Brougham Place and the commencement of King William Road.[1] It is considered to be one of two major shopping and dining strips within North Adelaide, the other being Melbourne Street.[2]

History

The street was named on 23 May 1837 at a meeting between the Governor John Hindmarsh, the Colonial Secretary Robert Gouger and several advisers including judge John Jeffcott.[3] It has been suggested that it was not named, as might have been presumed, for Irish political leader and Catholic emancipist Daniel O'Connell who was then at the peak of his career, but his son parliamentarian Maurice O'Connell, a fellow student of Jeffcott's at Trinity College and fellow expatriate of Tralee, Kerry.[4][5]

Originally, Jeffcott Street was intended to be the main north–south thoroughfare through North Adelaide, but drainage problems in the vicinity led to the opening up of the link through Brougham Gardens from King William Street and the resultant access to enter Adelaide city most directly from the north via O'Connell Street.[6]

References
  1. 2003 Adelaide Street Directory, 41st Edition. UBD (A Division of Universal Press Pty Ltd). 2003. ISBN 0-7319-1441-4.
  2. "North Adelaide". City of Adelaide. Retrieved 31 January 2020. O'Connell and Melbourne Streets have long been bustling dining and shopping destinations
  3. "Advertising". South Australian Gazette And Colonial Register. South Australia. 3 June 1837. p. 1. Retrieved 31 January 2020 – via Trove.
  4. Longergan, Dymphna (September 2006), "A place named Irishtown", Newsletter of the Australian National Placenames Society (PDF), Macquarie University, Sydney, retrieved 31 January 2019, [Adelaide's] street naming was left to a small group of pioneers. One of these was John Jeffcott, a Kerryman born in Tralee, who named Jeffcott Street after himself (or his father), Kermode Street after his fiancée, and O’Connell Street not, as has been presumed, after Daniel O’Connell, member of the British parliament at the time, but after his son, Maurice, who was a patron and fellow Trinity College graduate
  5. Ronayne, Jarlath (2002). The Irish in Australia. London: Viking. pp. 171–183.
  6. Longergan, Dymphna (September 2006), "A place named Irishtown", Newsletter of the Australian National Placenames Society (PDF), Macquarie University, Sydney, retrieved 31 January 2019, While O'Connell Street is North Adelaide's main street today, that was not the plan. On Light's map, Jeffcott Street is the principal street, leading as it does to Wellington Square. Drainage problems in the first few years of the colony, however, led to O'Connell Street developing as a principal street

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