Sydney Police Court - Corner Of Phillip & Alfred Streets - Sydney
Among the Royal Australian Historical Society’s Sydney Green Plaques, No. 94 is easy to walk past if you are racing for a ferry — and worth slowing down for. It marks “Police Court C,” the Police Court on Phillip Street that opened on 7 January 1886, on the Circular Quay side of the city between the older Water Police Court and the Water Police Station.
The courthouse was built of Pyrmont freestone to plans from the Colonial Architect’s office (James Barnet held that post) and was meant mainly as a summons and small-debts court, taking pressure off the older building next door. At the opening, Whittingdale Johnson — the first magistrate to sit there — remarked that the new rooms would let magistrates who had “suffered through the foul atmosphere of the old court” regain their health. Ventilation and windows got particular attention. The court closed in 1979. The building survives today as part of the Justice & Police Museum complex managed by Museums of History NSW, on Phillip Street near Circular Quay.
The green plaque belongs to the Bicentennial series (1984–1988) — 101 markers recalling vanished or layered city sites. Do not confuse this Phillip Street Police Court with the earlier Central Police Court / Market House site on George Street (now under the Queen Victoria Building), which has its own green plaques.
Image: RAHS / site marker for Police Court C / Phillip Street Police Court.