Hawkesbury Master Plan

Location

The Hawkesbury campus is located in the south-eastern part of Richmond, in the Hawkesbury River valley north-west of Sydney, within the Hawkesbury Local Government Area. The Blue Mountains National Park is in close proximity.

The size of the campus is 1,373 hectares. A discrete parcel of land known as the River Farm is located within the Richmond lowlands on the Hawkesbury River approximately 6 kilometres north of the main campus, and is also held by the University.

Londonderry Road connects the campus with the Richmond Town Centre, approximately one kilometre to the north. Richmond RAAF Base is situated north east of the campus. Richmond Golf Course adjoins the University’s land to the north. Hawkesbury Showground and Richmond Racecourse are both located east of campus.

History

Hawkesbury campus was established in 1891 as the Central Agricultural College (later known as Hawkesbury Agricultural College), to fulfil a need for agricultural education in the young colony of NSW.

Over the next century the college expanded to reflect the growing need for agricultural economics, seeing the opening of buildings, laboratories and many other facilities that serviced students, staff and the local community.

In 1972, Hawkesbury Agricultural College became a College of Advanced Education and earned a well-founded reputation for excellence in applied diploma level education and research. In January 1989, under the University of Western Sydney Act 1988, UWS Hawkesbury became a member of the newly-created federated university.

The University of Western Sydney Act 1997 resulted in the introduction of a single multi-campus university in place of a federation, and Hawkesbury became one of the six campuses of UWS.

Today

Today Hawkesbury is a campus focused on science and health, with a mixture of traditional discipline areas such as agriculture, horticulture, animal, environmental and food sciences and nutrition. New disciplines such as forensic, medical and natural sciences and environmental sustainability and management have been introduced.

Master Plan

A tender process has been undertaken to appoint suitably qualified external consultants for the project. The master plan will provide an appropriate and considered physical planning framework to guide the future development of the campus.

With residential development increasing through the North-West corridor, it is anticipated that Hawkesbury campus will experience growth in student numbers in the future.

This master plan seeks to enable the University to provide the best possible student experience and campus life.

For more information, please see Hawkesbury Master Planning Process.

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