Planning Canberra's memorial landscape

Much has been written about Canberra and other modern, democratic capitals, in terms of how their urban designs communicate national identity and values. But relatively little research has focused specifically on the layout of their various commemorative works or the formal tools and processes used to manage these, except for the case of Washington DC. Commemorative planning decisions in Canberra are shaped by its unique historical, cultural, topographic and political context. Over the past century, Australia’s federal government has developed a range of commemorative planning tools for Canberra, including physical master plans, formal open-space schemes and regulatory processes for individual memorial proposals. These tools have evolved in response to the developing constellation of built memorials and their scope of subject matter. Over the last decade, an expanding range of commemorative proposals from different interest groups and conflicting views as to their appropriateness has prompted the production of strategic guidelines for the capital, which pre-emptively suggest appropriate commemorative subjects, locations and forms and delineate the wider community values that memorial proposals should respect.