Plumbers Morley

Morley is a suburb of Perth, within the City of Bayswater local government area, situated approximately 10 kilometres (6 mi) northeast of the Perth central business district. It contains the Galleria Shopping Centre, one of Perth’s larger shopping centres. Morley bus station is located in the car park of the shopping centre. From the late 1950s, Morley (originally known as Morley Park) began to develop as a major shopping and commercial centre.

The name Morley began appearing on maps around the beginning of the twentieth century and was adopted when the Morley Park Estate was subdivided for urban development after the First World War. The most likely explanation for its use is that it commemorates Charles William Morley, who is known to have farmed in the area during the 1860s and 1870s.

The Morley area was in the early days of the Swan River Colony developed with agriculture. The area was originally known as Morley Park. In 1929 a landowner progress association petitioned the Bayswater Road Board for improved roads and lighting for improved transport of produce to markets.

Commercial icons appeared in the late 1950s and early 1960s, including the Wirrina Drive-In, the Morley Park Hotel and the Boans department store. Parallel with the commercial growth, a settlement program resulted in the residential development of Morley. This was achieved through a series of town planning schemes undertaken by Margaret Feilman, the consultant town planner to the Shire of Bayswater. These schemes especially catered to the needs of the home building companies whose style of large scale development was a new phenomenon of the 1960s.

Tonkin Highway was constructed through Morley in 1984, bisecting the suburb.