Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01869:reg:6:p13
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01869
Segment Type: reg
Provision Reference: reg 6 (pt 13/86)
Character Range: 44826–47673

Parkes Place (the landscape feature not the roads) and Anzac Parade are also located on the axis. These places form part of the Parliament House Vista, a place on the Commonwealth Heritage List. Other major features in the area are generally balanced about the axis, such as East and West Blocks, the gardens of Old Parliament House, the eastern and western parts of the National Rose Gardens, the Administrative and Treasury Buildings, the National Gallery/High Court group
  and the National Library/Questacon group, as well as the Carillion and the Captain Cook Memorial water jet. The road system also generally reflects the symmetrical planning of the area based on the Land Axis.

     2.3.  Summary history

  The architect of Old Parliament House, and the politicians and public servants who supervised and advised him, planned a building which would meet the needs of the federal Parliament for at least 50 years; they largely succeeded, even though major changes to the use of parts of the building began within a few years, and within a decade overcrowding had become an issue. The building proved to be adaptable and always remained hospitable, despite the number of users soaring well past what had been predicted and the nature of their work changing in ways unimaginable in the 1920s. The complex interplay of space and function at Old Parliament House, with both consistent and changing uses of spaces, mirrors the rich political and parliamentary history of Australia between 1927 and 1988. Largely intact and with a well-documented history, Old Parliament House is a unique artefact of Australia's twentieth-century political heritage.

  Although planning for the new capital began in 1912, infrastructure work had hardly begun when the First World War broke out in August 1914. Burdened by huge war debts, Billy Hughes' post-war government needed to move to Canberra quickly and cheaply, and therefore decided to build a 'Provisional House'. The design task went to John Smith Murdoch, Chief Architect in the Department of Works. The discussion of his first proposal by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works in 1923, with evidence from a wide
  range of experts including the presiding officers of the day, constitutes a key document for understanding how Parliament functioned at the time.

  Construction began in 1923, and was completed in 1927. Five million bricks made at the Yarralumla brickworks went into the building, along with 2000 tons of cement. Australian timbers were used, sourced from every Australian state except South Australia. Construction cost £644,600, and another £250,000 was spent on fit-out: a substantial sum, but not much more than the £478,449 allocated in the 1926–27 budget for the costs of running Parliament for one year.

  Although Murdoch included offices for the Ministry,