Parramatta gaol was designed to house habitual criminals and recidivists with long sentences who could be trained for productive work. By 1929, it had become the State’s principal manufacturing gaol, producing boots, brushes, tinware, clothes, joinery and foodstuffs. It also became a centre for rehabilitation, and the single cells were once more converted to multiple cells. It was closed from 1918 to 1922 and briefly used as a mental health facility.
Various unsympathetic architectural additions were made to the nineteenth century structure in the 1940s. In the 1970s, the Parramatta Linen Service, a large auditorium, and an extension to the 1846 gatehouse were built. In the 1990s, reception, administration and visitors’ buildings were designed to better match the original sandstone structure. The prison was briefly dis-established in July 1997.
In 2008, the Parramatta Correctional Centre is classified as a medium-security, short-term Remand Centre, Transient Centre and Metropolitan Periodic Detention Centre. It houses both un-sentenced and sentenced male inmates, including Drug Court sanctions and male periodic detainees. In 2012 Parramatta Correctional centre was closed.
Parramatta Gaol
