City of Adelaide

This article is about the local government area. For the metropolis, see Adelaide. For the city centre, see Adelaide city centre.

For other uses, see City of Adelaide (disambiguation).

34°56′S 138°36′E

City of Adelaide South Australia
Location of Adelaide within the Adelaide metropolitan area
Population	25,026 (2021 census)[1]
• Density	1,607.3/km2 (4,162.9/sq mi)
Established	1840
Area	15.57 km2 (6.0 sq mi)
Lord Mayor	Jane Lomax-Smith
Council seat	Adelaide city centre
Region	Metropolitan Adelaide
State electorate(s)	Electoral district of Adelaide
Federal division(s)	Division of Adelaide
Website	City of Adelaide
LGAs around City of Adelaide: Charles Sturt Prospect Walkerville West Torrens City of Adelaide Norwood Payneham St Peters West Torrens Unley Burnside

The City of Adelaide, also known as the Corporation of the City of Adelaide and Adelaide City Council, is a local government area in the metropolitan area of greater Adelaide, South Australia. It is legally defined as the capital city of South Australia by the City of Adelaide Act 1998. It includes the Adelaide city centre, the suburb of North Adelaide, and the Adelaide Park Lands, which surround North Adelaide and the city centre.

Established in 1840, the City of Adelaide Municipal Corporation was the first municipal authority in Australia. At its time of establishment, Adelaide's (and Australia's) first mayor, James Hurtle Fisher, was elected. From 1919 onwards, the municipality has had a Lord Mayor, as of 2023^[update] being Jane Lomax-Smith.

History

Further information: History of Adelaide and British colonisation of South Australia

Adelaide city centre, North Adelaide and the Park Lands

Initially the new Province of South Australia was managed by Colonisation Commissioners. Colonial government commenced on 28 December 1836. The first municipality was established in 1840 as The City of Adelaide Municipal Corporation, the first municipality in the country. However, due to a combination of constitutional difficulties arising from the mayor's resignation, hostility of the incoming Governor George Grey, and falling revenues due to the onset of the colony's first economic crisis, the corporation became moribund in 1843, after the Province had become a Crown colony established by the South Australia Act 1842. From 1843 to 1849, control and management reverted to the colonial government, and from 1849 to 1852 the municipality was managed by a Commission with five members. With the positive economic effects of the Victorian gold rush, a formal municipality was re-established in 1852, and "has operated continuously ever since".^[2][3][4][5] However, The city's relationship with the state and federal government has been described as being 'a continually abrasive relationship'.^[6]

The Council started in 1840 with nineteen members, who chose four of their number to be Aldermen, and then one of these (James Hurtle Fisher) to be Mayor. In 1852 the municipality was divided into four wards. Three Councillors and one Alderman were chosen, who in turn selected the Mayor. In 1861 the Mayor was chosen by all the electors and the position of Alderman was temporarily abolished. In 1873 the municipality was divided into six Wards, each represented by two Councillors. In 1880 the office of Alderman was recreated; they were chosen by electors of all Wards. The office of Mayor was raised to the stature of Lord Mayor by Royal Letters Patent in 1919. The Lord Mayor received the right to be styled ‘The Right Honourable’ in 1927.^[3][5]

The Arms of the City of Adelaide were granted by the Heralds College in 1929.^[2] In 1982 the Council approved the design of the Armorial Flag.^[2]

In 2015, the Council became the first government of any kind in Australia to offer a financial incentive for installing battery systems.^[7]

Governance

The City of Adelaide is legally defined as the capital city of South Australia by the City of Adelaide Act 1998, which also provides for a Capital City Committee, setting out its structure, function and responsibilities. The Act defines the Constitution of the council, including the role, allowances and benefits of the Lord Mayor and members. It defines the role of the CEO and their role with regard to Council employees. It continues the name of the council as "The Corporation of the City of Adelaide", and says that the land known as "The Corporation Acre" within the City of Adelaide is vested in the Adelaide City Council. It says that the name "Adelaide City Council" means the Corporation of the City of Adelaide.^[8][9][10]

As of 2019^[update] the City of Adelaide Council consists of 12 elected members, including the Lord Mayor and 11 Area and Ward Councillors, elected for a 4-year term.^[11] Area Councillors are elected by the voters of the whole council area as one electorate, while Ward Councillors are only elected by the voters of their respective wards.

Council

Current composition

The council, as of December 2022^[update], is:^[12]

Ward	Party		Councillor
Lord Mayor		Labor	Jane Lomax-Smith
Area Councillors		Independent	Arman Abrahimzadeh OAM
		Independent	Janet Giles
North		Independent	Phil Martin
		Independent	Mary Couros
Central		Independent	Carmel Noon
		Independent	Simon Hou
		Labor	David Elliot
		Labor	Jing Li
South		Greens	Keiran Snape
		Liberal	Henry Davis
		Labor	Mark Siebentritt

2022 election results

Main article: 2022 Adelaide City Council election

This section is an excerpt from Results of the 2022 South Australian local elections § Adelaide.[edit]

Area Councillors

2022 South Australian local elections: Area Councillors

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Team Adelaide	Arman Abrahimzadeh (elected)	1,851	22.0
	Independent	Anne Moran	1,790	21.3
	Independent	Janet Giles (elected)	1,686	20.1
	Independent Liberal	Domenico Gelonese	649	7.7
	Independent Liberal	Glenn Bain	639	7.6
	Independent	Frank Barbaro	612	7.3
	Independent	Juliette Lockwood	571	6.8
	Independent	Du Zhigang	383	4.6
	Independent	Josephine Patterson	217	2.6
Total formal votes			8,398	97.8
Informal votes			190	2.2
Turnout			8,588

North

2022 South Australian local elections: North Ward

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Independent	Phil Martin (elected)	878	36.0
	Team Adelaide	Mary Couros (elected)	659	27.1
	Independent	Sandy Wilkinson	410	16.8
	Independent	Valdis Dunis	289	11.9
	Independent	Robert Farnan	200	8.2
Total formal votes			2,436	98.0
Informal votes			50	2.0
Turnout			2,486

Central

2022 South Australian local elections: Central Ward

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Independent Labor	Jing Li (elected)	508	15.4
	Independent	Carmel Noon (elected)	466	14.2
	Team Adelaide	Simon Hou (elected)	355	10.8
	Team Adelaide	Alexander Hyde	338	10.3
	Independent Labor	David Elliot (elected)	337	10.2
	Independent	Mark Hamilton	315	9.6
	Independent Liberal	Gagan Sharma	238	7.2
	Team Adelaide	Franz Knoll	176	5.3
	Independent	Ben Ayris	135	4.1
	Independent	Fiona Hui	119	3.6
	Independent	Alex Radda	97	2.9
	Independent	Cassandra Papalia	75	2.3
	Independent	Hugo Siu	68	2.1
	Independent	Tammy Vo	65	2.0
Total formal votes			3,292	97.3
Informal votes			90	2.7
Turnout			3,382

South

2022 South Australian local elections: South Ward

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Independent Greens	Keiran Snape (elected)	758	27.4
	Independent	Colette Slight	277	10.0
	Independent Labor	Mark Siebentritt (elected)	275	9.9
	Independent Liberal	Henry Davis (elected)	263	9.5
	Independent	Theo Vlassis	241	8.7
	Independent Greens	Sean Cullen-Macaskill	199	7.2
	Independent	Ida Jonassen Llewellyn-Smith	165	5.7
	Independent Labor	Kimberlee Brown	146	5.3
	Independent Liberal	Helika Cruz	139	5.0
	Independent Liberal	Tim Scott	138	5.0
	Independent Greens	Sue McKay	115	4.2
	Independent	Param Ramanan	51	1.8
Total formal votes			2,767	97.3
Informal votes			76	2.7
Turnout			2,843

Population

At the end of the 20th century, the city had little more than thirty per cent of the population it had in 1915 (when the population reached more than 43,000), and about 5,000 less than the 1855 population of 18,259.^[5] In proposing reforms and his advocacy for town planning legislation, Charles Reade illustrated the Adelaide slums associated with the city's high population levels with lantern-slides accompanying his lecture "Garden cities v. Adelaide slums and suburbs" in the Adelaide Town Hall on 8 Oct 1914.^[13] Reade was attacked by the Adelaide City Council who fought against the Town Planning and Housing Bill reforms^[14] and the press pointed out the wickedness of families being forced to 'herd together more and more in overcrowded conditions of living' and the 'sheer nonsense on the part of the City Council to pretend' that there were no slums in the city:^[15]

The City Council does not want to learn. It seems to want the slum owners to be left untouched so that the landlords may reap their harvest of gold while the poor of this city reap their harvest of suffering, disease, and other ills associated with bad housing.^[16]

In seeking a return to higher density population levels, Adelaide City Council launched its 'New Directions' with its three themes of Capacity, Vivacity and Audacity on 3 July 2001.^[17] The "Capacity" theme proposed doubling the city's population by 2010 and increasing the number of City visitors and workers.

According to the Annual Reports,^[18] the population has increased rapidly, due to the targets stated in the strategic plans developed at about that time.

Coat of arms

Notes

• The population figures have been extracted from Adelaide City Council Annual reports. The data is summarised on pages 149-150 of A Thematic History.^[19] Additional data not in that summary can be found in the reports on the council's "Annual Reports" page.^[18]
• 1840 The initial Annual Report noted a population of 8,480, with 1,615 buildings in the city.
• 1844 The second available figure (6,107) is also the minimum recorded in council reports.
• 1880s There are no figures available for the period between 1881 and 1912. South Australia suffered a severe depression in the 1880s when the State population, (and probably the city's population too), declined.
• 1915 The peak population was 43,133.
• 1921 The State population passes 500,000. The city population was 39,458.
• 1963 The State population passes 1,000,000. The city population was 23,000.
• 1993 There is only one figure available between 1976 and 1999 – 11,405 in 1993. It was in the late 1990s that the council developed and started implementing its plans to increase the city's population, and not until 2004 when it started regularly updating the population estimates based on figures supplied by the Bureau of Census and Statistics.
• 2001 In 2001, the council set targets for population numbers for 2006 and 2010. These targets were raised considerably in 2003. In 2009, targets were set for 2012.

The following table sets out the figures of various types of city population in the 21st century:^[18][20]

Year	2016–17	2015–16	2014–15	2013–14	2012–13	2011–12	2010–11	2009–10	2008–09	2007–08	2006–07	2005–06	2004–05	2003–04	2002–03	2001–02	2000–01		2006 goal	2010 goal	2012 goal
Permanent residents	23,396	23,169	22,690	22,200	21,600	22,000	21,800	21,200	19,800	19,700	18,400	15,000	14,361	13,734			13,289		16,000 25,000	25,000 34,000	25,500
Dwellings	11,546	10,860	11,467	10,860	10,860		13,100	12,500	11,388	10,600	9,900	9,900	9,600	7,335	7,335		5,510
Overnight population						28,000	29,800	29,200	27,400	27,100	23,800	22,000	21,090	19,610	17,861	17,861	19,900				34,500
Overnight visitors						6,000	8,000	8,000	7,600	7,400	5,400	7,000	6,729	5,866
Daily visitors(*)	311,414	262,000	228,673	228,670	228,670		86,500	79,000	74,000	60,000	75,000	75,000	75,000	103,500	103,500				125,000	150,000
Workers	115,250	122,700	122,700	118,200	118,200	118,000	126,500	126,500	118,500	108,000	108,000	99,000	95,682	93,000	93,000		89,000		98,000	111,000	125,000
Students	67,100	64,000	64,000	86,700			90,000	88,000	86,700	81,100	75,000	63,000	59,240	51,900	50,597		50,000		58,000	66,000
Daily population								220,000	205,000	208,200	190,000	200,000	200,000	216,000	215,000
Office space(**)								1.503	1.443	1.200	1.184	1.038	1.100	1.109

 * Visitors to the city from the Adelaide Metropolitan area, for all purposes
 ** Square kilometres (millions of square metres) of office space. i.e. 1.503 km² = 1,503,000 sq. metres.

Adelaide Park Lands

Main article: Adelaide Park Lands

The city's 2010–11 Annual Report noted that the total area of the City of Adelaide is 15.6 km², of which 7.6 km² is Park Lands.^[21] Other sources put the Park Lands area closer to 7.0 km².^[22] The original area was 2,300 acres (9.3 km²⁾,^[23] a number the Council still regularly quotes.^[24]

Services and amenities

The City of Adelaide's administrative offices are located in the Colonel William Light Centre building at 25 Pirie Street, adjacent to the Adelaide Town Hall in King William Street.

Apart from providing the usual services like rubbish collection and controlling local development, the City of Adelaide owns and operates a number of city services and amenities, including:

• A network of 10 car parking stations (Andrew, Central Market, Flinders, Frome, Gawler, Grote, Light Square, Pirie, Rundle, Topham and Wyatt) branded as UPark.^[25]
• Adelaide Central Market, a popular tourist attraction and working market selling cheap fruit and vegetables and other products.
• Adelaide Aquatic Centre, offering several indoor heated swimming pools, diving facilities, and a health club.^[26]
• A network of local library and community centres from which local residents can borrow books, music, videos and computer programs, and gain access to computers and the internet.
• The council also runs a free bicycle service on weekdays, in conjunction with Bikes SA.
• Free bus services, 98C and 98A,(operated as The Connector until 2014), which runs through the central business district and North Adelaide, with stops at every major tourist attraction and council library.^[27] A new connector bus, with more seating capacity, entered service in 2007, replacing one of the smaller buses that used to ply the route. The bus is named Tindo (after the Kaurna word for sun) and is hailed as the world's first solar powered bus.^[28] The 98C is a clockwise loop while the 98A is anti-clockwise and the service has now been modified to better suit everyone's needs.^[29] The 97 was a temporary free bus which used to run for a few months.

Sister cities

The City of Adelaide has been involved in the Sister Cities program since 1972. As of 2023^[update] it has long-term international partnership arrangements with five cities, known as sister cities, based on formal agreements between Adelaide and each city. This allows collaboration in the cultural, educational, business, and technical spheres. The five sister cities are:^[30]

• Austin, Texas, USA, since 1983
• Christchurch, New Zealand, since 1972
• George Town, Penang, Malaysia, since 1973
• Himeji, Hyogo, Japan, since 1982
• Qingdao, Shandong, China, since 2013

Two cities are known as Friendship Cities, based on informal partnerships between two cities that promote collaboration and a friendly relationship between two cities:^[30]

• Dalian, Liaoning, China
• Chengdu, Sichuan, China

Flag

Main article: Flag of Adelaide

Flag of the City of Adelaide

The armorial flag of Adelaide was approved on 2 August 1982, replacing the unofficial coat of arms on white background, which had been flown outside the Town Hall on special occasions for about 50 years.^[31]

Key to the City

The Key to the city is presented by the Lord Mayor to an individual or group to acknowledge and recognise their outstanding contribution to the city of Adelaide.^[32]

Year	Name/Group
1991	Governor Michael Dukakis
1991	Captain Anthony Sturt
1992	David Hookes
1992	The 14th Dalai Lama
1992	The Salvation Army
1993	John Fitzgerald OAM
1994	Reverend Ivor Bailey AM
1995	Archbishop Stylianos Harkianakis
1996	Mark Woodforde
1996	1996 S.A. Sheffield Shield Cricket Team
1996	Adelaide Girls Choir
1996	Dr Andrew Thomas AO
1996	The Ecumenical Patriarch Vartholomeos 1
1996	Dame Roma Mitchell AC DBE CVO QC
1997	HMAS Adelaide
1997	Maritime Patrol Group RAAF Edinburgh
1997	Adelaide Football Club
1998	Adelaide Lightning Women's Basketball Team
1998	Adelaide 36ers Men's Basketball Team
1998	Band of the South Australia Police
1998	Adelaide Thunderbirds Netball Team
1999	Stuart O'Grady OAM
2001	Lleyton Hewitt AM
2001	Dr Jeffery Tate
2003	Mark Ricciuto
2003	Barry Humphries AO CBE
2004	John Coetzee
2004	Port Adelaide Football Club
2004	Rupert Murdoch AC KCSG
2006	Dr Bill Griggs AM
2008	Adelaide United Soccer Team
2010	Cheong Yew Liew OAM
2017	Adelaide Football Club Women's Team
2017	Gillian Rolton AM
2018	Mike Turtur AO
2021	Uncle Lewis Yerloburka O'Brien AO

Notable residents

• William Bragg – Nobel Laureate of Physics – X-ray crystallography as a method for 3-D structure determination of inorganic salts^[33]
• Robin Warren – Nobel Laureate of Medicine – Discovered role of Helicobacter pylori in gastric ulcers^[34]
• Paul McDermott – Host of Good News Week

See also

• List of mayors and lord mayors of Adelaide
• List of Adelaide parks and gardens
• List of Adelaide suburbs
• Local government areas of South Australia

References

1. Australian Bureau of Statistics (28 June 2022). "Adelaide (C)". 2021 Census QuickStats. Retrieved 28 June 2022.
2. "History". Adelaide Council. Archived from the original on 28 February 2011.
3. Lord Mayors & Mayors Archived 2 March 2011 at the Wayback Machine, City of Adelaide
4. Books mentioned on the City of Adelaide history webpages: Those Turbulent Years. A History of the City of Adelaide 1929–1979, Pubs, pews and powerbrokers, The City of Adelaide - A Thematic History Archived 19 November 2010 at the Wayback Machine
5. A Thematic History, pp81-82.
6. Morton, After Light p. 10

   The city's relationship with the state and federal government has been described as being 'a continually abrasive relationship'. Until 1877 the relationship with the colonial government was described as 'a grudging tolerance, breaking out occasionally into active resentment whenever the council felt its rights were being infringed'. Moreover, matters such as alienation of the Park Lands by the state government, and threats to do so by the federal government, together with the fact that the federal and state government were exempt from rates for the many city buildings they owned, did nothing to enhance the relationship between them and the city corporation.

7. Sophie Vorrath (23 June 2015). "Adelaide City Council offers energy storage incentive, Australia's first". Renew Economy. Retrieved 7 July 2015.
8. "City of Adelaide Act 1998". Government of South Australia. Attorney-General's Dept. Retrieved 4 December 2019.
9. "City of Adelaide Act 1998, Version 31/3/2016" (PDF). 31 March 2016. Retrieved 4 December 2019.
10. "City of Adelaide Act 1998". AustLit. South Australian Current Acts. Retrieved 4 December 2019.
11. Your current Council City of Adelaide, 2019. Retrieved 14 October 2019.
12. "2022 Council Elections". ECSA. Retrieved 9 December 2022.
13. Where are the Slums? Mr. Reade on Garden Cities. The Journal, 9 October 1914, p 1.
14. Leonie Sandercock. 'Adelaide: Property, Privilege and Power' in Property, Politics, and Urban Planning: A History of Australian City Planning 1890-1990. p 81.
15. City Council, Slums, and Town Planning.Daily Herald, 11 September 1916, p 4B.
16. City Council, Slums, and Town Planning.Daily Herald, 11 September 1916, p 4C.
17. Annual Report 2001/2002 Archived 30 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine, Adelaide City Council, p 2.
18. Annual Reports, City of Adelaide
19. A Thematic History, pp149-150.
20. 2016-17 2015-16 2014-15 2013-14 2012-13 2010-11 Archived 30 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine 2009-10 2008-09 2007-08 Archived 30 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine 2006-07 2005-06 2004-05 2003-04 2002-03 2001-02 Archived 30 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine 2000-01 1999-00 1998-99 1997-98
21. Annual Report 2010-11 Archived 30 March 2017 at the Wayback Machine, City of Adelaide, p. 1.
22. Fiction and Facts about the Adelaide Park Lands, Adelaide Parklands Preservation Association.
23. "The Park Lands". The Herald. 6 September 1902. p. 7 – via Trove.
24. Our Parks, adelaideparklands.com.au
25. "UPark". City of Adelaide. Retrieved 7 October 2022.
26. "Adelaide Aquatic Centre". City of Adelaide. Retrieved 2 October 2018.
27. City Connector Adelaice City Council
28. "All-Electric, Solar-Powered, Free Bus!!!". Ecogeek.org. 27 December 2007. Archived from the original on 8 September 2009. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
29. "New free City connector bus service". Adelaide City Council. Archived from the original on 22 December 2015. Retrieved 16 October 2015.
30. "Sister cities". City of Adelaide. 1 April 2019. Retrieved 14 November 2023.
31. City of Adelaide Arms and Flag
32. "Key to the City". Retrieved 1 November 2024.
33. "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1915: William Bragg, Lawrence Bragg". Retrieved 12 September 2011.
34. "The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2005: Barry J. Marshall, J. Robin Warren". Retrieved 12 September 2011.

• McDougall & Vines (2006) The City of Adelaide - A Thematic History, www.adelaidecitycouncil.com. (PDF, 780Kb, 156 pages)
• Peter Morton (1996) After Light: A History of the City of Adelaide and its Council, 1878–1928

Further reading

• Ball, Corinne. "Adelaide City Council". Adelaide.
• Elton, Jude (10 December 2013). "Light's Plan of Adelaide, 1840". Adelaidia. History Trust of South Australia.
• Adelaide, City of (5 June 2014). "Town Acre Reference Map – Map of the City of Adelaide". data.sa.gov.au. PDF Archived 15 January 2021 at the Wayback Machine
• Williamson, Brett (2 November 2015). "Adelaide City Council: Australia's first ever council celebrates an unusual 175th anniversary". ABC Radio Adelaide. Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

External links

• Official website