Stockinbingal

Postcode: 2725

Stockinbingal is a village in Cootamundra Shire in the South West Slopes region of New South Wales, Australia. It is also a part of the Riverina. It had a population of 242 in 2001, including 3 indigenous people (1.2%) and 23 foreign born people (9.5%). It is on the Burley Griffin Way.

It is the location of a railway junction connecting the Cootamundra to Lake Cargelligo railway line (completed to Stockinbingal in 1893) to Parkes, which provides an alternative route from Sydney to Parkes to the route over the Blue Mountains, avoiding that route's steep grades and is now as a result the major route for freight between Sydney and Perth. The route from Cootamundra to Stockinbingal and Parkes is also part of a rail bypass of Sydney for traffic between Melbourne and Brisbane via Dubbo, Werris Creek and Maitland.

Like most Australian towns with Aboriginal names no one knows exactly what the word 'Stockinbingal' meant. Local mythology says it means 'full belly' but equally it is believed that the local water supply, now known as Bland Creek, was known to the Aborigines at Tocumbidgie or Tocumbimbil with 'tocum' meaning deep hole and either 'bingara' meaning creek or 'bimbil' meaning white leafed box tree. Somewhere in the past someone added an 'S' and changed a letter or two so that the result is a word no Aborigine would recognise.

Today the town is a small centre with many empty shops and houses and no new development. Time and transportation have changed Stockinbingal from a thriving township to a quiet community.

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