ASK most people which city in the world is their life's dream destination and you would probably expect them to name a place redolent with history such as Rome, or oozing the exotic, as in the case of Istanbul. You don't expect them to say Canberra.
But town planners are not most people. They see things differently, as I learned from the vantage point of Manhattan, heart of the greatest metropolis on earth. Canberra was the centre of this town planner's universe and the template of his country's new model metropolis. There in New York City, he explained Canberra was the only truly planned city in the world that works.
"Tell me," he asked breathlessly, "is it as wonderful as everybody says it is?" All I could think of was the school excursion in 40C heat to the War Memorial and memories of sheep grazing on the dusty, yet-to-be-filled Lake Burley Griffin.
Having lived in Canberra continuously for the past 20 years and brought up an educated nine children, six now university graduates, I am appreciative of the city's great natural beauty, extraordinary cultural advantages and privileged life style, but I have often thought that my planning friend might be more ambivalent about what he would find in the national capital.
For a start, during the past 20 years Canberra has suffered from a surfeit of government. During that time it has had a second layer of government imposed on its unwilling populace. As a direct consequence of the ACT government, Canberra is the most highly taxed jurisdiction in Australia, with charges and levies such as the utilities tax imposed with no redress. We have the highest water charges in the country, with the most restricted usage, and the rates and taxes on property are also among the highest.
But there is another problem that has deeply affected Canberra's uniqueness. Runaway medium-density development in the inner suburbs and significant compromises in terms of planning and amenities in the outer suburbs have relegated the famous planned city to the past. Consequently, the city's social structure, which had been uniquely democratic, is suffering.
Canberra has a reputation for being full of smug, well-heeled public servants but it is more complex than that. It exists on many levels. On the one hand it is a big country town but its social structure has always been egalitarian. There was a sense of pioneering camaraderie among the third and second-generation Canberrans. They had been born in the same hospital, gone to the same primary schools and to one of about two high schools. Their children, then grandchildren, saw one another at the shops in every established neighbourhood, swam in the neighbourhood pool and remained friends with those they knew from kindergarten into adulthood.
On another level, as the seat of government, it is a sophisticated place, with embassies, universities and national cultural institutions (although most federal politicians can only find their way between Capitol Hill and the airport). What is uniquely egalitarian about Canberra is the blending of the two elements, the local and everyday and the sophisticated and public worlds. So it is not unusual to discover that the neighbour mowing his grass on the weekend was the head of the armed forces, or the retiree in the modest house on the corner was ambassador to three countries, or the family you have known from church and the school is part of a larger Italian clan that owns one of the oldest businesses in the city. Everyone goes to Fyshwick on market day.
There were areas better than others, such as Forrest; and those that were worse, such a Narrabundah, but are now gentrified. Partly due to a policy of spreading government housing, Canberra remained egalitarian. However, lately this has started to change. The city is developing a split personality, and increased population and development of new areas has a lot to do with this.
Due partly to a huge influx of well-paid bureaucrats, and the expansion of the ACT bureaucracy, inner Canberra has started to develop a Dink culture and all that goes with that. Out with the fruit shop and butcher, in with the smart restaurants and cafes, and a demand for high to medium density housing. The lake's once green Kingston foreshores are covered in low-rise medium and high-density housing with ludicrous names and price tags to match. Similar development is everywhere. Some units are scraping the million-dollar mark.
But the development isn't just on land newly released by the ACT government, it has spread to the inner suburbs so that some areas -- such as Campbell, where I live -- have a surfeit of cafes but no fruit shop.
In the past, such development would probably not have been approved. The ACT government is financing its budget from land sales. Established families are being relegated to new developments on the northern and southern fringes: no bad thing if the amenities were as good. But unlike in the past, this building boom is not controlled by federal planning entities.
The people of Dunlop and Harrison are at the mercy of ACT Chief Minister Jon Stanhope's centralising government.
Walter Burley Griffin's pioneering vision has been chucked. Yes, at Dunlop you can buy a 550sq m house for the same price as an ex-government three bedroom in inner Canberra. But there is no neighbourhood school; there is a super school at Harrison with 1000 children in primary alone. The high school is another super school.
There will be no small neighbourhoods as in the old suburbs. Local shops? There are not even any deciduous trees at Dunlop, and if you aren't old enough to drive a car, then tough. There are almost no buses in the greenest, highest taxed city in Australia, outside of peak times .
Irrespective of whether Canberra stays at a population of 330,000 or goes to 500,000, the capital is now at tipping point. On the one hand it still has much to recommend it as a place to reside. It is clean, reasonably safe and easy to live in.
On the other side there is planning development hell, no public transport, a contraction of local services, particularly the schools, and a reduction in green space.
Within the precinct of the parliamentary triangle, the National Capital Authority has sway. A huge expansion of the ASIO premises, which will bring 1800 new employees into the inner suburban precinct, is continuing, despite numerous complaints at large public meetings. It is the federal government this time. More government and even less say.
as posted here
