Luna Park Sydney

Where it sits. Luna Park occupies a narrow shelf of reclaimed foreshore at Milsons Point, on the northern side of Sydney Harbour directly beneath the eastern approach of the Harbour Bridge. The site is barely three hectares, wedged between the water and the sandstone cliff that carries Alfred Street, and the Ferris wheel turns with the bridge arch framing it. Milsons Point railway station is a two-minute walk and ferries dock at the park's own wharf. Nothing about the location is accidental — the land was the construction workshop for the Harbour Bridge, and the park was built on it as soon as the bridge was finished.

The story behind it. Luna Park Sydney opened on 4 October 1935. It was effectively transplanted: the operators dismantled Luna Park Glenelg in Adelaide and shipped it east, rebuilding rides and structures on the new site. The entrance — the Face — was designed by Rupert Browne, and it has been rebuilt many times since, growing progressively larger and more benign; older Sydneysiders will tell you the 1950s version was more unsettling than the present one. Coney Island, the funhouse behind it, is the survivor that matters: it opened with the park in 1935 and is the only operating amusement funhouse of its era anywhere in the world, complete with slides, turntable, distorting mirrors and the Devil's Drop.

Fire, closure and reopening. On 9 June 1979 the Ghost Train caught fire during operation. Seven people died, six of them children. The park closed within weeks and the disaster has never been satisfactorily explained; inquests and subsequent investigations have raised questions that remain open. It reopened as Harbourside Amusement Park in April 1982, closed again in 1988, reopened in January 1995, and closed a year later in February 1996 after residents in the apartment towers above complained about noise from the new Big Dipper. The site's future was contested for years until the Luna Park Site Act 1990 dedicated the land permanently to amusement and public recreation. The current incarnation opened on 4 April 2004, and the park was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register in February 2010. A redevelopment closed it again in January 2021; it reopened that October with new rides.

On screen. Because it is small, self-contained and instantly legible as an amusement park, Luna Park has been used by productions since the 1950s. Its credits are unusually varied.

• Summer of the Seventeenth Doll (1959) — the film of Ray Lawler's landmark Australian play.
• Our Lips Are Sealed (2000) and Candy (2006), the latter starring Heath Ledger and Abbie Cornish.
• Dil Chahta Hai (2001), the Bollywood classic that shot a substantial Sydney sequence here.
• Chocolate Oyster (2018).
• On television: Six O'Clock Rock (1959–1962), Skippy the Bush Kangaroo (1969), Number 96 (1976), JAG (2000), Farscape (2001), Dance Academy (2010) and Mr Inbetween (2019).
• Music videos have used it steadily, from Seventeen's Healing (2016) to Lady Leshurr's On My Way (2018).

What you actually see today. Entry through the Face is free; rides are paid for individually or by unlimited-ride pass, which is the sensible option. The Ferris wheel gives the single best low-level view of the Opera House and the bridge together. Coney Island is the reason to come — a heritage-listed 1930s interior operating exactly as intended, with the Joy Wheel and the Barrel of Fun still running. The Big Top, the park's ballroom-scale venue, hosts concerts. The Crystal Palace and the Palais rank among Sydney's better Art Deco interiors and are used for events. Around the edges, the harbour foreshore walk continues under the bridge towards Lavender Bay and Wendy Whiteley's Secret Garden.

Getting there and timing. Take the train to Milsons Point or a ferry to the park's wharf; driving is not worth it. Opening hours are restricted and vary week to week — the park does not open every day, and checking before travelling saves a wasted trip. Evenings from spring to autumn are the best time: warm air, the harbour lit, and the Face glowing above the water. The park closes for private events with some regularity, and school holidays fill it. Photographers should shoot from the Lavender Bay side at dusk, when the wheel, the bridge and the city towers stack into one frame.