Moss Vale is a town in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales, Australia, in the Wingecarribee Shire. At the, it has a population of 8,579 and is sited on the Illawarra Highway, which connects to Wollongong and the Illawarra coast via Macquarie Pass. Moss Vale has several heritage buildings. In the centre of the main street is Leighton Gardens. Moss Vale is believed to have fertile soil and good precipitation. Agricultural rural holdings in the area specialise in dairy herds, mainly Holstein Frisian, and there are an assortment of beef studs and sheep properties. The town has a commercial district and a golf course. The Wingecarribee Shire Chambers are located here. Moss Vale has a which is located at 49 Berrima Road, Moss Vale. Moss Vale has undergone recent gentrification. It has become a hub for independent and creative business, including design stores, cafes and bars.
History
The Moss Vale area was once occupied by the Gundangara people, though they had disappeared by the 1870s, partly due to the loss of their hunting land to European settlers. Governor Hunter sent a party led by ex-convict John Wilson to investigate the area in 1798. Various others explored the area up to 1815, including John Warby, George Caley, Hamilton Hume and John Oxley. Hume, Charles Throsby and Joseph Wild explored the area west of Sutton Forest in 1817 and in 1818, together with James Meehan, they explored the area between Moss Vale and Jervis Bay. Governor Macquarie granted Throsby, known as Throsby Park, at Bong Bong, on the northeastern outskirts of Moss Vale and put him in charge of building the Old Argyle Road from Sydney to Goulburn in 1819. This road was replaced in the 1830s by a more direct road via Berrima surveyed by Thomas Mitchell and most of the population of Bong Bong moved to Berrima. The heritage-listed property of Throsby Park house was built about 1834, six years after Throsby's suicide. The area, which was considered to be part of Sutton Forest, remained rural until the coming of the railway. Subdivision part of Throsby Park for the town of Moss Vale, named after Jemmy Moss, a herdsman at Throsby Park, commenced in 1864, in anticipation of the opening of Sutton Forest railway station in 1867 at the intersection with Old Argyle Road. Governor Belmore rented Throsby Park from 1870 to 1872 to what is commonly believed to escape the summer heat of Sydney. The railway and the Robertson Land Acts encouraged denser settlement by selectors in the Southern Highlands and led to the growth of Moss Vale as a town. In 1877 Sutton Forest railway station was renamed Moss Vale.
Heritage listings
Moss Vale has a number of heritage-listed sites, including:
78.2% of people were born in Australia. The most common other countries of birth were England 4.4%, New Zealand 1.7% and China 1.5%.
87.2% of people only spoke English at home. Other languages spoken at home included Mandarin at 1.3%.
The most common responses for religion were No Religion 25.8%, Anglican 24.9% and Catholic 22.1%.
Industry
Moss Vale holds a large part of the Southern Highlands Industry – as well as being a minor centre for agriculture, many light and medium industries are found in and around Moss Vale, including a James Hardie plant, a Harper Collins book distribution centre, and other manufacturing industries. Despite Moss Vale's prowess as an industrial centre, nearby Bowral is the commercial heart of the Southern Highlands.
Transport
is the primary southern terminus of the Southern Highlands railway line. The line provides regular services from Moss Vale to southern Sydney, where a change of trains is generally required to access the city centre. Limited services continue south of Moss Vale to Goulburn. The station also has two Sydney to Melbourne services and two Melbourne to Sydney services a day. Moss Vale is the junction of the Unanderra – Moss Vale railway line to Wollongong, opened in 1932, but now only used by freight trains.
