Another version of the origin of the name relates to Robert Fleming, a Brunswick resident who had owned land beside the Saltwater River and operated a butchery there.

Flemington and neighbouring Kensington consist primarily of weatherboard cottages mixed with attached brick single-storey and some double-storey terrace houses.

The Victorian Goldrush of the 1850s encouraged further development as Mount Alexander Road was the main route to the North Western Goldfields.

This business, established by members of the Debney family, moved to the site in 1876 and at one time covered more than an acre of ground and consisted of several buildings.

Industry consisting of mills, factories and warehouses continued in the area taking advantage of the low-cost flat land.

In the late 1990s, a new shopping plaza was constructed on an old car sale yard on Racecourse Road, directly west of Newmarket Station.

Several new apartment buildings were built on empty allotments behind the Racecourse Road and Pin Oak Crescent shops.

Barry Humphries declared in 2005 that his favourite building in Melbourne was the Flemington Post Office, which is on Wellington Street.

Flemington also contains a large public housing estate consisting of four twenty storey towers and several three and four-storey walk-up blocks of flats.

[11] The estate was constructed in the 1960s on flat land adjacent to the Moonee Ponds Creek on a site previously occupied by factories.

However, the line does not serve Newmarket station, instead running direct to North Melbourne, Southern Cross and Flinders Street.