Brunswick Street

Brunswick Street (also known as the WT Peterson Community Oval) is the home ground for Fitzroy from it's formation in 1883 through to 1966, and from 2009 to the present day.
==Construction and early years==
The oval is part of the Edinburgh Gardens. In the early years two cricket ovals were established with the first in 1862 used by the Collingwood Commercial CC. The second was established in 1863 and was used by the Prince of Wales CC. In 1872 the two clubs merged to form the Fitzroy Cricket Club and used the southern of the two ovals. In 1881 land was taken up by what would became the modern day Gardens, ending the life of the northern oval and establishing the southern oval as the main cricket venue.
In 1883 the Fitzroy Football Club was formed and started sharing the ground with the cricket club. By the end of the 1880's the configuration of the oval that remains today was established. A tennis club was also established making the area the sporting hub of the suburb of Fitzroy.
==The Lions leave==
For many years the hub worked well. Two stands had been established with the venue hitting it's peak in 1935 with 36,000 people in attendance for Fitzroy's VFL game against Collingwood. However nothing was improving - in fact it was falling in to disrepair. As crowds for football matches were larger than those for cricket it affected the football club more. But as the cicket club managed the venue as a whole the football club was hamstrung. Other VFL clubs were backing the Fitzroy Football Club's calls for improvements but both the cricket club and the Fitzroy City Council were rejecting all approaches. In 1962 Fitzroy FC looked towards Preston as a venue but couldn't get an agreement.
Finally when the Fitzroy Council health officer condemned the change rooms in 1966 and the football club still couldn't get an agreement with the council about the venue as a whole, they left. The final VFL game was played at Brunswick Street on August 20, 1966 against St Kilda, but the Fitzroy FC maintained it's training headquarters at Brunswick Street until 1969 when it was moved to the Junction Oval.
==Various uses==
The Fitzroy CC continued to play at the venue. In 1977 one of the two grandstands was destroyed by fire after the ground hosted soccer for two seasons during the Winter. The short lived Fitzroy Rovers Football Club played at Brunswick Street in the late 70's and early 80's but all the work put in to the venue by the council was now focused on community instead of sport. This included a community room built in the 1980's.
Finally in 1986 the cricket club left. Fitzroy had merged with sub district club Doncaster and moved out to Doncaster's ground. Community use now seemed to be the venue's only future. The one positive was the registration of the remaining grandstand on the Victorian Heritage Register in 1990.
==The return of the Lions==
Local football returned to Brunswick Street in 1991 with University Reds playing it's home games at the venue. This worked well with much smaller crowds for the third string University team easily catered for.
But the Fitzroy Football Club, by this time out of the VFL/AFL except in an on field merger with Brisbane, had re-emerged and in 2001 had started to sponsor Uni Reds. This led to a name change to the Fitzroy Reds, and finally the Lions tooks over operations of the club bringing the club back onto the field in it's own right and back home at Brunswick Street in 2009.
In 2006 meanwhile, the remaining grandstand was renamed the Fitzroy Football Club grandstand.
The football club is now in B Grade in the VAFA.
Category:Venues