Jordanville

Jordanville is a residential locality, 14 km south-east of central Melbourne, immediately east of Chadstone. Most of the area once known as Jordanville is in Ashwood and Chadstone.

The name Jordanville dates from 1930 when it was given to the railway station, newly opened on the line from East Malvern to Glen Waverley. Other names had been considered, including St Johns Wood, the name of an estate to the north of the station that had recently been acquired by the Riversdale golf club. When the club moved there the area was rural, and that remained the case until the early postwar years. The choice of Jordanville came about from the Jordan family, particularly John Jordan who was an early settler and shire councillor.

In the early postwar years the Victorian Housing Commission constructed a large housing estate a few kilometres west at Alamein. In 1948 it began its Jordanville estate, building many houses in concrete from its prefabrication factory at Holmesglen. The Commission distinguished two parts to its estate, Jordanville North and Jordanville South. The railway line divided the two estates which extended from Warrigal Road to Huntingdale Road. Jordanville North had about 740 Commission dwellings and Jordanville South about 1040. Jordanville South had a school opened in 1953, taking children from the Holmesglen migrant hostel. Jordanville North’s school also opened in 1953, but it was named Ashwood. That name did not take precedence, however, as next door to the Ashwood school the Jordanville technical school was opened in 1955.

When Jordanville North was unaffected by the name Ashwood, a neighbourhood shopping centre was built in High Street Road. It included unusual igloo or parabolic concrete structures (shop and residence) designed by Robin Boyd as an economical postwar building method (1952). They are on the Victorian Heritage Register. The local post office avoided any conflict between Ashwood and Jordanville by being named Stocksville. ‘Ashwood’ superseded Jordanville in the place name in about 1956.

Jordanville technical college was superseded by Ashwood secondary college and the Jordanville locality retreated to the railway station’s immediate environs. A local park is named Jordan Reserve.