The Melbourne skyline as viewed from Yarra's Edge, Docklands, Melbourne after sunset. Reproduced courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

At the beginning of the twenty-first century the lower reaches of the Yarra flow through Melbourne’s central business district and the Docklands, a regulated canal contained by artificial banks, weaving its way between office and apartment skyscrapers, sprawling industry and port facitlies, and finally emptying out into Port Phillip Bay.

Geological Survey of Victoria Map of Melbourne in the 1850s, showing the old course of the Yarra River, the area now occupied by a modern container port, heavy industry, and dockland high-rises.

In recent years, with the creation of the Southbank and Docklands precincts, the banks of the lower Yarra have witnessed a transformation. In addition to being popular with Melburnians enjoying the outdoors in adjoining parks and gardens, the Yarra has become a focus for new recreation, dining, commercial and retail spaces.

River Yarra from Queen's Bridge, 1914

Further upstream, efforts to clean up the river and prevent pollution flowing into it from adjoining factories and suburbs have succeeded in restoring the river to some degree of natural health and beauty. In some of the large suburban parks like Studley Park Gardens, you could be forgiven for thinking that you were in the country, surrounded by native bushland and wildlife, yet only a stone’s throw from the centre of the city. The upper reaches of the Yarra, at places like Warrandyte and Warburton, are as popular as ever, attracting new generations of Melburnians eager to relax in the Yarra Ranges.