The expected increase in population also made necessary the provision of public amenities, which Midland Junction still lacked. The first of these was a recreation ground. [Þ] In 1901 the Municipal Council acquired for the sum of 500 pounds a site of 6 ¾ acres which stood at thew outer edge of the town's development. The ground was cleared, levelled and fenced, and was opened for public use on the 21st October 1901. It was quickly made use of by sporting bodies [Þ] which until then had to make do with the Midland Railway Company' reserve as their venue.

In 1897 the Council had introduced street lighting in the form of oil standard lamps into the town, but in 1902 these were replaced by electric lamps. A power generating plant operated by the Council provided the electricity supply for street lighting and private premises in both Midland Junction and Guildford.

By 1906, ten years after the establishment of the Municipality, Midland Junction still had no permanent Council chambers. A loan was floated in Victoria for the construction of a Council chambers and a new town hall, and architects were invited to enter a competition for the design of the buildings. The Council chambers were completed first and still stand at the Junction of the Great Eastern Highway and the Old Great Northern Highway. The building was described in the local newspaper as having been designed in the French renaissance style', but "gold rush baroque' would be a more apt description. The main entrance was circular, entered through a pillared portico and carried up through three stories where it was surmounted by a dome. The Town Hall, when completed, was in similar style, and had seating for nine hundred people. [Þ]

Midland Junction still lacked a public hospital and a courthouse. A courthouse was built about 1910 on the public triangle [Þ] facing Helena Street, but it was not until 1954 that the town obtained its first hospital. In the meantime a series of small private hospitals operated within the town.

Another Council project was the acquisition of a stretch of land bordering the Swan River [Þ] for public bathing and recreation. After several false starts, a suitable block of land was acquired near 'Woodbridge', [Þ] and was open for public use by 1915.

Apart from the provision of amenities by the Council, private bodies and businesses provide increasing facilities for public entertainment. A racecourse [Þ] was established on the outskirts of the town, in the locality now known as Midvale. A skating rink called the 'Empire' was opened in September 1910, and was at first enthusiastically supported, but its popularity declined, and in 1915 it was converted to a picture theatre. The first motion pictures were shown in the Town Hall in 1910, and a picture theatre called the 'Renown' was subsequently opened. [Þ]

A library of 800 books was set up in the Midland Junction Mechanics' Institute in 1906. This was considered inadequate for the size of the town, and the Council made an application for a grant offered by a Scottish-American millionaire, Andrew Carnegie, to towns throughout the world to conduct free public lending libraries. The application was successful, and a new library building, consisting of an octagonal bay attached to the old Town Hall, was built on the public triangle [Þ] and opened in May 1912. The Carnegie Library [Þ] remained a distinctive part of the town centre until its demolition in 1966. In 1913, a new post office designed in the Queen Anne style was build on the corner of Helena Street and the Great Eastern Highway to replace the earlier post office. By now the central triangle [Þ] was almost completely filled with public buildings jostling each other for space.

In the years between the turn of the century and 1910, churches [Þ] were erected to cater for all those denominations so far unrepresented including the Presbyterians, Roman Catholics, Salvation Army and Baptists. A Catholic convent school conducted by the Sisters of Mercy was opened in 1906. The two-storey residential wing of the convent, built in the same year, still stands as an important part of Midland's townscape.

The expected growth of Midland Junction as an industrial centre never occurred to the extent hoped for, and the main element in the town's economy was occupied by Government enterprise in the form of the Railway Workshops. A further step in this direction was taken when the town was chosen as the site for the public abattoirs. An earlier public abattoir, built during the convict period at Claise Brook near Perth, had fallen into disuse, and the slaughtering of livestock now took place at numerous privately operated slaughterhouses throughout the metropolitan area. This situation was regarded as dangerous to the public health. In 1902, a Select Committee of the Legislative Assembly was set up to inquire into the most suitable and convenient site on which to erect public abattoirs.

Midland junction was eventually chosen. Slaughtering for the domestic market began in 1914 in new buildings on part of the Municipality Council saleyards in Military Road. Private slaughterhouses in the metropolitan area were immediately closed by law. The abattoirs were a new source of employment and remained a well-known part of the town until their final closure in 1982. The last of the buildings, which formed central part of Midland Junction before the Great War was the Railways Institute, built in 1914. This held accommodation for staff of the Railways Department, and in addition housed the Midland Junction Technical School, originally opened in a nearby cottage in 1908. With the completion of the Railways Institute, the character and pattern of Midland Junction had been set for many years to come. On the eve of the Great War, the town was no longer a neglected village struggling to survive, but an established and populous community, with assured employment from Government industry and a full share of public amenities.

Text and pictures extract from:
ON THE SWAN A history of the Swan District, Western Australia
by: Michael Bourke
Tel: 9274 4316
Email: Aquila44@hotmail.com
Bourke, M. J. (1987): On the Swan, A history of the Swan District, Western Australia, UWA Press, Australia, ISBN 0 85563 258 0