Meeting Floods and Fires

I was one of the original Development Officers in the NSW TAB Property Section, starting in July 1964. Two of the many interesting experiences I had during my nine years with the TAB involved fire and flood.

The first relates to the Grafton branch 176. When I was undertaking the survey of Grafton with the view to establishing a branch (no agencies in those early days) I interviewed the Mayor. A practice we always had when first visiting a town. I was most anxious to meet him as Grafton was notorious for flooding and this would affect my opinion on where to site the branch. In my discussions I suggested that we would probably locate the branch in the street immediately behind the main street which was higher and above the then known flood levels.

The Mayor said there was no reason not to locate the branch in the main street on two points. The first, that in the event of a flood, no trading took place anyway due to everyone trying to clean up. The second of his points, and to me the more worrying, was that Grafton would not flood again. When I asked him why, he said that “millions” had been spent on flood mitigation works to divert flood waters away from the town. I mention that when talking to retailers in South Grafton, for this was also an area for a possible second branch (South Grafton 335), they confirmed this but were most angry for these works would direct the floodwater straight into the South Grafton Retail Area!

On returning to Head Office I completed my report recommending that the branch be located in the main street. However I added that whilst the Mayor was most confident that the main street was flood proof, I noted that these flood mitigation works were yet to be tested by the elements! About a fortnight after the branch opened, so did the heavens and the branch was flooded to almost ceiling height. The General Manager, John Robertson, looked up my original report and drew my attention to the part where I had said “Yet to be tested by the elements”. It was following this experience that we decided to use waterproof timber for the collating benches in flood prone areas. We found that those in the Grafton flood actually floated causing damage to the shop fronts in the swirling water. We also learnt from experience that it was important to drill holes in them, and anchor them to the floor and walls, so that they wouldn’t float.

The second concerns the original branch 35 Bondi Junction. It was located in the Moama Arcade between Oxford and Spring Streets. I was preparing to leave home early on a Monday morning for an appointment with the Mayor of Kogarah Council when the phone rang. It was my superior Barney Page advising that the Moama Arcade had just burnt down and he wanted me to meet him on site as we had to move quickly and find alternative premises. Boy what a challenge I thought as I drove over to Bondi Junction for it was a very strong retail centre and virtually no vacant shops. However on reconnaissance I noticed a number of empty shops slightly down the road on the other side of Oxford Street.

I made enquiries of the Waverley Council and found that NSW State Railways owned all the vacancies. They had been acquired as the eventual site for the Bondi Junction Railway Station and Bus Terminal. So I got in touch with a colleague, Fred Clutton, Chief Property Officer for the Railways. He confirmed that it would be at least two years before demolition would take place and would be happy to lease one of the shops to us on a short-term basis until we found more permanent premises. Ray Braley and his team went into action fitting out these premises, and within, I think, about two weeks after the fire we were open for business in these temporary premises. Boy those were the days. Later I was able to purchase a site in Spring Street, where we built new branch premises. There is another story in that but it is probably better left for another day.

Just as a matter of interest, in those first early years we averaged opening a branch every two weeks.

Ray Sweetman July 2008

(Ray Sweetman worked for TAB from 1964 until 1973 when he joined the Bank of New South Wales - now Westpac – as Senior Property Manager. Ray retired in 1991. See a photograph of Ray in Photos Section 2)