The City of Ryde is approximately 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) from the centre of Sydney and occupies most of the land between the Parramatta and Lane Cove rivers.

At the time of the arrival of Europeans at Sydney Cove in January 1788, the Wallumedegal or Wallumede were the traditional owners of the area and they called it Wallumetta.

[4] Throughout much of the nineteenth century, most of the land in West Ryde, Eastwood and Denistone was consolidated in a handful of large estates owned by a few of the colonial elites, notably the Blaxland and the Darvall families.

Much of the land in this suburb lying to the west of the main northern railway line was originally granted to Dr William Balmain in the mid to late 1790s.

He was a retired English army officer with strong family connections to the British East India Company.

In May 1840, the Darvalls leased Deniston Farm and 40 hectares (100 acres) of land from a Dr Forster, for a period of 12 years.

The Meadowbank Railway Bridge across the Parramatta River was completed in August 1886 and was followed by the opening of a single line track from Strathfield to Hornsby on 17 September 1886.

By the end of the nineteenth century, some Darvall land had been sold, yet the bulk of the Ryedale Estate remained intact.

The first subdivisions were between Clanalpine and Rowe streets (Eastwood) in the north and between Anthony Road and West Parade in the south-east.

All that remains at the original site (apart from the old and new churches) is a small group of buildings, one of which is two-storey, with a blank end wall.

Other twentieth-century subdivisions proposed included the Ryde New Township Estate in the Falconer and Hermitage Road area in 1906.

By 1909 Ryde Heights, which was located on the southern side of Blaxland Road between Benson Lane and Melville Street was advertised as 'the pick of the district – 10 special residential sites for high class houses overlooking the windings of the Parramatta River'.

[5] The railway hotel was built on the corner of Victoria and Ryedale Roads in 1892 and a handful of shops established themselves nearby in the following decade.

In a period of three years, more than 40 new shops were built, as well as six banks, two restaurants, a service station and a new post office.

The Ryde Pumping Station, now fully electrically operated, supplies water to many Northern Sydney suburbs.

Since the new centre opened in 2005, it diverted many people from the ageing Top Ryde Shopping Square, which subsequently closed and has now been redeveloped.

[1] The types of dwellings in West Ryde continues to shift away from the traditional separate houses and towards strata living.

There is also a substantial number of Askin-era red-brick apartment blocks atop half-acre concrete expanses.

However, the factories of the past are slowly succumbing to demolition, and the construction of waterfront apartments are taking their place, with views of Parramatta River and Sydney Olympic Park, thus the suburb is growing with affluence.