sentences:  Due to the needs of the growing city for central sporting grounds and residential development, the gardens are currently one tenth their original size.Queens Gardens is the surviving remnant of Townsville's former Botanical Gardens Reserve (Queens Park) proclaimed on 14 June 1870.Nineteenth century gazetted botanic gardens were more commonly known as Queens Parks, named in commemoration of Queen Victoria who reigned as Monarch of the British Empire from 1836 to 1901.