| Type: | town |
| Moe | |
| State: | vic |
| Use Lga Map: | yes |
| Coordinates: | -38.1722°N 146.2678°W |
| Postcode: | 3825 |
| Pop: | 9,375 |
| Area: | 105.3 |
| Area Footnotes: | [1] (2011 urban) |
| Dist1: | 130 |
| Location1: | Melbourne |
| Dist2: | 12 |
| Location2: | Morwell |
| Lga: | City of Latrobe |
| Lga2: | Shire of Baw Baw |
| County: | Buln Buln |
| Stategov: | Morwell |
| Stategov2: | Narracan |
| Fedgov: | Monash |
Moe [2] is a town in the Latrobe Valley in the Gippsland region of Victoria, Australia. It is approximately 130-1NaN-1 east of the central business district of Melbourne, 45-1NaN-1 due south of the peak of Mount Baw Baw in the Great Dividing Range and features views of the Baw Baw Ranges to the north and Strzelecki Ranges to the south.
At June 2018, Moe had an estimated urban population of 16,812[3] (including Newborough). The population has been slowly shrinking with an average annual rate of -0.1% year-on-year for the five years to 2018. It is administered by the Latrobe City Council.Moe was originally known as The Mowie, then Little Moi. The town's name is believed to derive from a Kurnai (local Indigenous) word meaning "swamp land".
Moe is a navigation point and stopover for tourists en route to Erica, the historic goldfields township of Walhalla, the Walhalla Goldfields Railway and Mount Baw Baw. Lake Narracan is nearby, and Moe is home to the annual Moe Cup horse races, the Moe Jazz Festival and the recreated historic settlement Old Gippstown. The city has locally produced Aboriginal/Koori art and is regularly home to local Australian Football and Netball Finals in the Gippsland Football & Netball Leagues and the Mid Gippsland Football League. The region is represented by Gippsland Power in the TAC Cup competition.
A small gold discovery was made in 1852. The small settlement on the Narracan Creek was a stopover en route to the Walhalla goldfields further north.[4] A Post Office opened on 17 March 1862.
In 1878 the Shire of Narracan was proclaimed, and the railway arrived from Morwell. Moe railway station was a key station, with a roundhouse, and connections to the now-closed Walhalla, Thorpdale and Yallourn lines.[5] The town was surveyed in 1879. Moe was declared a city in 1963.
A major local industry is based around the brown coal deposits in the Latrobe Valley east of Moe and electricity generation. The area is also noted for its dairy industry.
Moe High School opened in 1953, with the Official opening in November of the same year. The school was closed and merged into Lowanna Secondary College in 1994, with the previous Moe High School location becoming a housing estate.
On the night of the 2011 census there were 15,292 residing in the Moe urban centre: 51.7% female and 48.3% male. At the time Moe had an Indigenous (Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander) population of 1.4%, whilst 79.8% of the overall population were Australian born caucasians. The other main countries of origin were: England (4%), Netherlands (1.5%), Scotland (1.2%), Germany (1.1%) and Malta (1.1%).
Moe Railway Precinct Revitalisation Project: A clock tower was constructed in 2012 incorporating two bronze clocks that chime on the hour. The clocks were manufactured in Moe by local clockmaker Alan Cox. Electricity supply lines on George Street (one of Moe's main streets that intersects with Moore Street from Saviges Road to Anzac Road) have recently been placed underground at a cost of over $2 million. The undergrounding included the installation of new street lighting and two 66 kV distribution boxes which will be used to place the remaining supply lines in the CBD underground in the future.
Moe has three large urban housing developments.
Mitchell Grove (off Mitchells Road) is a two-kilometre walk west of the CBD of Moe and has two residential housing stages (Mitchell Grove Stage 1 & Mitchell Views) next to a newly completed artificial wetland. The first entrance street to the new development has been named Discovery Boulevarde. Mitchell Grove development is likely to exceed 1,000 residences.
Monash Views is a 221-lot development in final implementation off Monash Road and Coach road in the suburb of Newborough approximately five kilometres from the Moe CBD. The development plan includes a partial redevelopment of the Yallourn Golf Club which borders the estate to the north by Ogilvy-Clayton. The final size of Monash Views development through to Haunted Hills Road may exceed 1,000 residences.
Another large-scale development is in final planning stage near Lake Narracan, a few kilometres from the Moe CBD. The development will be bordered by Thompsons Road, Moe Golf Club, Hayes Road and the south shore of Lake Narracan—then extending to Becks Bridge Road to the west. The first developed section is in an area planned to have around 1,000 homes—of a total of approximately 4,000.
Moe is serviced by a number of primary schools including:
Moe is also serviced by two secondary colleges:
Tertiary education is offered through GippsTAFE (Yallourn, Warragul, Leongatha, Morwell). Federation University also has its Gippsland campus at nearby Churchill.
The economy is mainly driven by the primary sector of the economy, natural resources and the secondary sector including coal mining, processing and fossil-fuel power generation[6] for the National Electricity Market.
The local agriculture industry is involved in the production of wool and dairy products, as well as vegetable growing.
Moe has a varied and wide range of sporting facilities available for use.
Australian Football and Cricket
Ted Summerton Reserve in the west end of Vale Street, Moe is used for Australian Football and Cricket and is a 900-metre walk south along Fowler Street to Vale Street from the Moe V/line train station and CBD. The reserve is undergoing development and has recently had an upgrading of its facilities including an upgrade to the players facilities, preparation of the surrounds of the playing surface for spectator stands to be constructed, spectator terracing, new South Street entrance gate, upgraded scoreboard, and the development of a shared community facility called Moe P.L.A.C.E on the property borderline between the reserve and the adjacent South Street Primary School, far enough back from the eastern wing of the playing surface for a future spectator stand.
The Moe P.L.A.C.E. facility is accessible from both Ted Summerton Reserve and South Street Primary School seeing as it has S.S.P.S on one side and Ted Summerton Reserve on the other, and was completed in 2011. The facility is part of the Moe Southside Community Precinct and includes a sports hall with side music room and stage at its northern end, community facilities and an Early Learning Centre at its southern end. The development is part of the Moe Southside Precinct development. Moe has an Australian rules football team competing in the Gippsland League, the Moe Lions, whose home ground is Ted Summerton Reserve. The reserve is owned by government, administered by Latrobe City Council and has a permanently elliptical surface.
The reserve has been identified as a venue for Women's T20 cricket during the 2026 Commonwealth Games held across Victoria.
The reserve is named after Edward (Ted/Toby) Summerton (1917-1990) who served many years as both a Councillor and Mayor for the former City of Moe.
Olympic Park in Moe is located next to the outdoor swimming pool at the east end of Vale Street and is used for soccer. It has two rectangular pitches, one north–south and one east–west. It is the home ground for Moe United Soccer Club who play in the Latrobe Valley Soccer League. The Victorian regional leagues are the eighth level of soccer in Victoria, and the ninth nationally.
A new community sports building is on the east side at Olympic Park. The reserve is owned by government, administered by Latrobe City Council.
The Olympic Pool in Moe is at the east end of Vale Street next to the Olympic Park Reserve. The Moe Outdoor Pool features a 50m Pool, Children's Pool, Diving Pool, Kiosk & Electric BBQs, Beach Volleyball Court, Change Facilities, Ample grass & shade shelters. The pool has recently undergone a multi-million-dollar upgrade. It boasts a separate diving pool, a 50-metre pool and a newly constructed children's pool with an interactive splashpad.
The reconstruction works were carried out by local businesses and administered by Latrobe City Counci.[7]
The local leisure centre consists of a 25-metre, six-lane indoor heated pool, a unisex spa at one end of the complex and sauna at the other, gymnasium with both electronic and state-of-the-art pin-loaded equipment (including rowers, treadmills, exercise bikes and steppers), squash court, 400-metre all-weather athletics track and grass field with asphalt cycling track around the perimeter, night lighting for the athletics track and indoor sports halls featuring four full-sized indoor basketball courts that are utilised by local basketball, netball, volleyball and badminton associations. The complex also has ample parkland around it and the Newborough Football Ground is also adjacent to the complex.