City campus of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology
The urban City campus of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) is located in the city centre of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia. It is sometimes referred to as "RMIT City" and the "RMIT Quarter" of the city in the media.
The City campus is RMIT's original campus and was founded in 1887 as the Working Men's College (now Building 1). The college was initially established as a night school for the instruction of "art, science and technology" - in the words of its founder Francis Ormond - "especially to working men". Ormond believed that the college was of "great importance and value" to the fast-pace industrialisation of Melbourne during the late 19th century. Subsequently, he campaigned for it to be located in the city centre. His nominated site, on the corner of La Trobe Street and Bowen Street, was donated by the government from land reserved for the colonial Supreme Court. The site was chosen so that the college would benefit from a proximity to the Melbourne Public Library and Art Gallery (now the state State Library of Victoria) on the corner of Swanston Street and La Trobe Street.
Due to its location in Melbourne's former justice precinct, the college originally bordered the Melbourne Gaol, City Watch-House (now Building 19) and Supreme Court (later the Magistrates' Court and now Building 20). As the gaol was progressively decommissioned and demolished, the college expanded over the site - and also acquired many of the surrounding former judicial buildings. As a result, the campus occupies an historically (as well as archaeologically) significant area of Melbourne's city centre. The unprecedented success of the college, and its eventual growth into what is today RMIT, was not considered in planning of the day. Subsequently, the campus developed in an unsystematic manner when land or buildings were able to be acquired - leading to the contiguity of the campus with the city during the 20th century.
Today the City campus is the largest of RMIT's five campuses - now located across the metropolitan area of Melbourne and in Vietnam. As of 2010, it has a gross floor area of 307,466 m2 over 68 buildings. It is situated over a six city block area of roughly 720,000 m2, to the north of the La Trobe Street-end of Melbourne's Hoddle Grid, and is a convergent part of the city centre's northern section. The scattered nature of the campus within the city has been likened to the campuses of New York University and the Sorbonne - as by Australian foreign minister Bob Carr for example.
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