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were built in 1963 at the intersection of Anzac Parade and Parkes Way.  The Anzac Parade vista was accentuated in this period by the construction of the two monumental portal buildings on Constitution Avenue, aligned to the edge of the building development in Reid and Campbell.  Anzac Park East was completed in 1965 and Anzac Park West in 1967-68.  The Portal Buildings, first proposed by the Griffins, and in essence endorsed by the later important planning consultant for Canberra, Sir William Holford, framed the processional way to the Australian War Memorial, and gave a much greater measure of definition to the Land Axis.  (Marshall and others 2010b, vol. 1, pp. 73, 87)

  Figure 40.  Anzac Parade looking South in 1968.  The Desert Mounted Corps Memorial circled, the first memorial on Anzac Parade.  The Portal Buildings define the lake end of the northern Land Axis along Anzac Parade.
  Source:  National Archives of Australia, A7973, INT1015/22

  Figure 41.  Australian War Memorial and Anzac Parade looking North in 1968
  Source:  National Archives of Australia, A7973, INT1015/42

  Figure 42.  Women Against Rape in War carry a banner along Anzac Parade, 1982
  Source:  ACT Heritage Library, Canberra Times Collection, photographer Martin Jones, 008857

Redesigning Anzac Parade
A redesign of Anzac Parade was proposed in the early 1990s, through the Anzac Parade Urban Design Competition.  The competition and the work of the four finalists was reported in Landscape Australia (Olsson 1992), offering an interesting perspective on the appreciation of the aesthetics and symbolism of Anzac Parade as interpreted by these teams of highly experienced Australian architects, landscape architects and other designers.

The brief given included addressing 'the national significance of the site, given its symbolic importance in relation to the War Memorial and its axiality with Parliament House' along with other factors such as the 'continuity of the land axis' and determining an 'edge to the Parade within an urban setting that will endure'.

Following the Griffin concept, Anzac Parade was to be 'the urban artefact which most clearly linked the National Capital functions to everyday life' (Weirick quoted in Olsson 1992, p. 50).  But in reality, Anzac Parade was becoming car dominated, severed from the lake by a parkway, the eucalypts were suffering dieback, and the design was not well terminated at the lake shore (Olsson 1992, p. 50).  Weirick also noted,

    'certainly one measure of our departure from his [Griffin's] intentions is the total lack of people in Anzac Parade, the site of Griffin's plaisance.  For some reason, it was deemed appropriate to repeat the desert-like emptiness of Anzac Parade in the desert-like forecourt of the New Parliament House.  Emptiness, it seems, is central to the experience of Canberra.'  (Weirick 1991, p. 16)

The