Woronora, NSW 2232

Quiet, leafy riverside suburb in southern Sydney about 27 km south of the Sydney CBD, in the Sutherland Shire, with its residential area lining both banks of the tidal Woronora River south of the Woronora Bridge. At the 2021 census Woronora had just 2,043 residents, and locals describe a suburb that has 'curiously escaped the development that its surrounding suburbs have experienced' — it is completely ringed by bushland with only a single road providing access, which residents feel has preserved its strong sense of community. The name 'Woronora' is an Aboriginal placename, first applied to the river and recorded in spellings such as Wooloonora and Wolonora from the 1820s–30s; suggested meanings include 'black rocks' and 'river of no sharks', though linguists note these definitions lack documentary support. Despite the name, the large Woronora Memorial Park cemetery is not in this suburb — its official address is 121 Linden Street in neighbouring Sutherland, about 0.5 km west of Sutherland station, with its grounds bordering Woronora's bushland.

At a Glance

Transport

Woronora has no railway station and no direct rail access — its only road in is Menai Road across the Woronora River Bridge (opened 2001, about 600 m long, replacing the Old Woronora Bridge), which links the suburb to Sutherland on the eastern bank and Menai on the western side. Public transport is by bus: U-Go Mobility's line 965 runs from Sutherland Station to Woronora village along Menai Road (about 5 minutes from Sutherland station to Woronora Village Tourist Park), giving access to the T4 rail line at Sutherland. A footbridge crosses the river at the southernmost limit of housing on the western bank, and some riverside houses on the eastern bank can only be reached by walking track or by boat.

Schools

Woronora Public School — NSW government primary school on the Prince Edward Park Road side of the suburb, which opened in 1942 and is reached via a footbridge across the river; it is the catchment school for the suburb's children.

Shopping & Amenities

Woronora's riverside village facilities are small and locally focused: an RSL Club, general store, cafe, riverside restaurant, hairdresser and bottle shop, clustered around the village core by the Woronora River, plus a boatshed, a rugby league/cricket oval and a caravan park. It is also home to the only floating fire station in Australia, which serves residents whose riverside houses have no road access. For supermarkets and most retail, residents cross the Woronora Bridge to the much larger Sutherland town centre in the immediately adjacent suburb of Sutherland.

Parks & Outdoors

The Woronora River is Woronora's defining feature: the suburb's housing lines both banks of the tidal river, which is popular for boating, fishing and canoeing, with a public boatshed and boating facilities along the foreshore. The suburb is completely ringed by bushland with a single road in, and Prince Edward Park — between the river and adjacent Sutherland — offers cleared riverside recreation space with boating and fishing facilities, home to the Woronora Life Saving Club, 1st Woronora River Scout Group and the Sutherland Region Girl Guides canoeing centre. Native fauna is abundant, with frequent koala sightings in the upper cemetery region bordering Woronora Memorial Park, a seal that lived on the fire brigade pontoon in 2020, and a platypus spotted entering and leaving the river in December 2024. The Woronora River is tidal at this point and water levels can be affected by releases from Woronora Dam upstream.

Property Market

The median house price in Woronora was around ~$1.6M — YIP (yourinvestmentpropertymag) puts the Woronora median house price at $1,595,000 with 26 house sales in the past 12 months (mid-2026). See our full Sydney property price map for how the suburb compares across the city. Woronora's sales market is genuinely thin — YIP counted only 26 house sales in 12 months and the suburb has a very small population — so published medians swing widely between trackers and windows. Riverside and water-frontage properties sell at a strong premium to the suburb median, while the limited stock rarely hits the market. Treat any single median for Woronora as indicative rather than precise.

New Developments

Development in Woronora has been minimal by design: the suburb is ringed by bushland, has a single road entrance, and residents have successfully resisted change for decades — most notably in 2006, when then-planning minister Frank Sartor intervened to zone the Woronora–Woronora Heights fire trail closed to general traffic after local protests that opening it would turn quiet Woronora into a shortcut between Engadine and Menai/Sutherland. The Woronora River Bridge (2001) and its shared pedestrian/cycle path remain the main transport infrastructure serving the suburb.

Jobs & Local Economy

Local employment is small-scale — the riverside village's RSL, general store, cafes, boatshed and the floating fire station provide limited local jobs, and Woronora Public School employs teaching staff. Most residents commute: Sutherland, immediately across the river and the Sutherland Shire's main centre, is the hub for retail, health and council employment, while professional workers head to the Sydney CBD via Sutherland station on the T4 line.

Nearby Suburbs

Sutherland, Jannali, Bonnet Bay, Bangor, Woronora Heights

Sources & method

Researched 4 September 2026 from named public sources — census and government records, transport authorities, council and planning documents — plus published sales data. Where sources disagree on a figure, the guide says so rather than picking one.

Sources cited in this guide:

• Transport for NSW

Corrections are welcome — if something here is out of date or wrong, tell us and we will fix it.

Back to all Sydney suburb guides.