Green Valley, New South Wales

Green Valley was originally home to the Cabrogal people who spoke the Darug language. It was covered in eucalyptus forests and home to native animals such as wallabies and possums that were hunted by the Cabrogal for meat, hides and bones. When Governor Lachlan Macquarie established a town at nearby Liverpool in 1810, the surrounding areas were soon granted to British settlers who began clearing the forests for farmlands.[2]

A large area to the northwest of Liverpool was dubbed Green Valley. As well as the present-day suburb of Green Valley, it included what is now known as Ashcroft, Busby, Cartwright, Heckenberg, Miller, Sadleir and parts of Hinchinbrook and Mount Pritchard.[3]

One of the first settlers in the area was Peter Miller who gave his name to the nearby suburb of Miller. Another was Charles Scrivener who served as mayor of Liverpool and who oversaw the establishment of Green Valley School in 1882. When the first children began their classes, the school was nothing more than a large tent although a wooden building with an iron roof was constructed not long after.

By the 1960s, Sydney's suburban sprawl had reached Liverpool and the Housing Commission's development of the Green Valley Housing Estate between 1961 and 1965, was the largest single housing scheme ever attempted to that date. Within the space of a few years 7,464 cottages, flats and units were built and, by 1966, over 24,000 people were living in an area that had been occupied by market gardeners, dairymen and poultry farmer farmers a decade earlier.

It was, however, a long time before residents were provided with adequate services such as public transport, health services, shopping centres and other necessary facilities, and before 1970 there were no pre-school centres. There was however a local post office, the Green Valley Post Office was open from 1964 until 1973 when it was renamed Miller.[4]

Unlike older suburbs of Sydney, where streets often run parallel in a grid pattern, Green Valley has been designed where streets follow the contours of the area, so that many streets are curved and follow an almost semi-circular pattern. Many of the streets in the suburb of Green Valley have Aboriginal names, such as Arunta, Kinkuna, and Naranghi.

• Busby West Public School[5]
• Green Valley Public School[6]
• James Busby High School[7]
• Green Valley Islamic College[8]

According to the 2016 census, Green Valley had 12,516 people living within its perimeters. The median household income of $1,572 per week was on par with the national median ($1,438). Most occupied private dwellings in the suburb were standalone (82.5%) with 17.3% semi-detached or townhouses. A higher than average number of homes were being purchased (41.5%). 45.2% of people were born in Australia. The next most common countries of birth were Vietnam 8.9%, Iraq 6.5%, Fiji 4.6%, Cambodia 2.9% and Laos 2.4%.[1]