Mid-century architecture archivist and museum staffer Martin Miles is standing by his love of the Bauhaus-inspired flats along the Northbourne corridor that are destined for redevelopment under the ACT government's light rail plans.
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Mr Miles said the Northbourne Housing Group and the Allawah, Bega and Currong flats in Braddon "are run down and sit on valuable inner-city land, so it's just a matter of time". He said it was "a great pity that, of the really quite small number of such places, we don't seem to have the imagination to do something with them".
The flats sit along the Northbourne Avenue corridor in the area set to be declared a special precinct to allow the Capital Metro rail link from Gungahlin to the city to go through.
Nearly 15 years ago, in the heady smartphone-free days, Mr Miles, a former ANU history student, started the Canberra House website to document local homes he thought were unloved and ostracised in therace to build.
Mr Miles trekked through the city and photographed its unpolished architectural gems, taking care not to invade inhabitants' privacy. With a few IT skills and research from the Royal Australian Institute of Architects, the Canberra House web archive was born.
Since then, a network has grown across the capital of architecture fans who keep in contact about houses coming up for sale, to try to keep them in the hands of the heritage-conscious.
Designed by Ancher, Mortlock and Murray for the National Capital Development Commission in 1959, the Northbourne Housing Group was built in 1962.
On his website, Mr Miles, who does not live in a heritage building, writes that the flats were "Canberra's and probably Australia's first and only true example of the rationale of the Bauhaus principles used for public housing".
When the Harry Seidler-designed house in Yapunyah Street in O'Connor was earmarked for demolition, Mr Miles was one of a few locals who agitated for the house to be saved. He hit the phones and chatted to the man himself, Seidler.
"He was a staunch passionate defender of his work," Mr Miles said. "He was unhappy that it was demolished.". The house fell in 2007.
Mr Miles said he may have softened over the years and he was "not as strident" as he used to be, but still found the demolition of heritage houses a shame.
"There's still a lot of original places here, but they're really been niggled away," he said. "If we're not vigilant about it, there won't be anything left."
