221

221 London Circuit. Probably the easiest address to find in Civic, for obvious reasons.

The building was constructed in 1969 as 'Electricity House'. It underwent a name change to 'ACTEW House' in 1992, following the merger of the electricity and water & sewerage utilities in 1988, and then to 'ACTEW AGL House' when ACTEW and the Australian Gas Light Company formed a partnership. That name has relocated elsewhere in the city with the organisation's head office, and the building is now known as '221 London', and even has its own website.

The red sculpture on the left is Choice of Passage, by Phil Spelman.

Delivering the mail

Postman at the intersection of Southern Cross and Coulter Drives, Belconnen. Belconnen is behind us, the suburb of Page is in front to the left, and Florey is ahead and right. The postie was rugged up well against the cold yesterday - they have to deal with freezing temperatures in winter, sweltering temps in summer, and magpies in spring.

Some fast facts from the Australia Post website, referring to the 2009-10 year:

 

• We delivered 5.1 billion items of mail.
• We deliver to 10.7 million Australian addresses.
• We deliver mail five days a week to 98.8% of delivery points.
• We deliver mail two days a week to 99.9% of delivery points.
• We maintain approximately 16,039 street posting boxes.
• 96.1% of domestic letters were delivered on time or early.
• 97.9% of bulk mail was delivered on time or early.
• The basic postage rate is 60 cents. 

 

On the wings of a dove

The ACT Memorial, Ainslie Avenue, Civic.

This is a two-part memorial: the physical part you can see in these photos, and a website with the stories of those who are commemorated. The memorial honours men and women who were associated with the ACT prior to active service in conflicts, peacekeeping missions and related activities.

The sculptural part of the memorial was designed by Canberra artist Matthew Harding, and installed in 2006. The tall 'wings' or 'feathers' represent the Dove of Peace, enfolding the globe/world and the memorial space.

The website includes a database of people eligible for inclusion in the memorial, and if you know or are related to someone eligible, you can apply to have them added to the database. The ACT Heritage Library has many interesting stories too.

City living

City Plaza Apartments on City Walk, Civic.

The apartments were built in 1996, above the shops and businesses in the city centre. They overlook a pedestrian plaza and the Canberra Centre - a large shopping centre, and from the top you could possibly see across to Mount Ainslie. The only thing I could find about the apartments through Google was that they can be rented short term through Canberra Wide Apartments, but some of the balconies suggest that people live here on a longer term basis.

The eyes have it

Stencil art in Ainslie Avenue in the city. The work (and there are quite a few more eyes and mouths in the complete work) is by a guy named Luke, but better known as E.L.K. He's apparently moving more into art for gallery exhibitions, but I really like these images, out in the elements.

High school basketball courts

Late afternoon light on the treetops around the Melba-Copland high school basketball courts.

I'll meet you at the bike racks after school

The empty bike shed at Melba-Copland high school, waiting to be occupied again on Monday. Abandoned, apart from the dead leaves and a damaged dictionary left behind on the cold concrete floor ...

Men at work

Roadworks at the intersection of Hindmarsh and Melrose Drives, Woden.

Woden was the name given to a property bought in 1837 by Dr James Murray. Dr Murray was a classical scholar as well as a medical doctor, and the name 'Woden' probably came from the Norse God of War and Patron of Learning.

Woden was the first of the Town Centres to be developed in Canberra, with people moving into newly constructed houses in the surrounding suburbs from 1962 onwards. Woden Town Centre is in the suburb of Phillip, named for Captain Arthur Phillip who led the First Fleet and became the new colony of New South Wales' first Governor. Hindmarsh Drive is named after Sir John Hindmarsh, the first Governor of South Australia, while Melrose was the name of a homestead in the area.

Busy Fyshwick

Canberra is a planned city, and some suburbs have particular functions. Many are primarily residential, some are industrial, some have large retail precincts. Fyshwick is mainly light industrial and bulky retail - furniture, motor vehicles, building materials and so on. Unlike most of Canberra, which is a pretty well-behaved city, Fyshwick tends to be messy and a bit chaotic. Vehicles park all over the place, there's a lot of traffic, and there are large bright signs everywhere. It's also one of two Canberra suburbs where prostitution is a legal business (the other is Mitchell), so it's busy at night too.

Fyshwick was named after Sir Philip Oakley Fysh, a former Tasmanian Premier in the late 19th century. The suburb's streets are named for Australian industrial towns and regions. Collie is a coal mining town in Western Australia, while Wollongong, a city on the NSW coast south of Sydney, has a history of mining and steelworking, and is an important seaport.

This is the scene this morning out the front of Joe's Motorcycles in Collie Street, looking toward Wollongong Street.

Dreaming art

This mural is located on the grounds of Melba-Copland Secondary School High School Campus (high school in Canberra is Year 7-10, about 12-16 years of age, and is followed by college - Years 11 and 12, about 17-18 years of age).

The mural was painted by Dale Huddleston and dated 2001. Dale is an Aboriginal artist, and is well represented in Canberra schools. He was a student at Woden Valley High School and worked as artist-in-residence with the ACT Department of Education for 10 years.