Melbourne was one of the inaugural districts of the first Assembly in 1856. Its area was defined by the 1855 Act as: : now Flemington Bridge Melbourne was abolished in 1859, its area was split into the new electoral districts of
East Melbourne and
West Melbourne, each having two members. Melbourne was re-created as a single-member electorate by the Electoral Act Amendment Act 1888 which took effect at the 1889 elections. Since 1908 the seat had been traditional
Labor territory since 1908, but had become increasingly marginal against the
Greens since 2002. Senior Labor minister
Bronwyn Pike successfully held the seat against strong Greens challenges at three subsequent elections, defeating future Greens Senator
Richard Di Natale in 2002 and 2006, and prominent lawyer
Brian Walters in 2010. Pike resigned in 2012, and Labor candidate and
City of Melbourne councillor
Jennifer Kanis retained the seat after a
closely contested by-election, which saw her finish second on primary votes to Greens candidate Cathy Oke but win on preferences. Kanis lost the seat to Greens candidate
Ellen Sandell at the
2014 election. Along with the seat of
Prahran it was the first win for the Greens in the
Victorian Legislative Assembly. ==Members==