Pumping Station Gallery Visit

Take your students back in time to 1890’s Smellbourne but without the smell! Students experience the history of how the city of Melbourne solved one of the biggest issues of a growing metropolis... sewage. The Pumping Station was built to pump sewage from Melbourne to the treatment plants at Werribee using Steam engines.  

Today the Pumping Station is no longer pumping sewage but it’s history and preservation provides a self-guided and curriculum-aligned learning experience for primary and secondary students.  

Students will experience 

• The story of how the Pumping Station transformed the city of Melbourne  
• The staggering size of the steam engines and the boilers that produced the steam 
• How technology has transformed through time  
• Walking through a tunnelling shield that was used to build tunnels under the Yarra River  
• The story of how the Pumping Station transformed the city of Melbourne  
• The staggering size of the steam engines and the boilers that produced the steam 
• How technology has transformed through time  
• Walking through a tunnelling shield that was used to build tunnels under the Yarra River  

Students will learn 

• How technology was used to improve health and sanitation issues in Melbourne  
• That gravity is an essential force in the engineering of a sewage system  
• How the engineering design process is used to create solutions that solve socio-scientific issues  
• The mechanics and engineering of steam engines and sewage systems  
• That water is an important resource which cycles through our cities and environment, and that we need to take care of it 
• The rich history and science of the Spotswood Pumping Station, including the role of female scientist Lucey Alford 

Other key information 

For a guided educational experience in the Pumping Station, please follow the link to FlushBack: An Augmented Reality Scavenger Hunt in the Spotswood Pumping Station.  

Related Links

• Pumping Station