While politicians, including Chief Minister Andrew Barr and Planning Minister Mick Gentlemen, are quick to cite environmental considerations and alleged public demand for "densification" as the basis for the policy, the fact is very few people outside of the corridors of power are buying it.

In February this year Marc Roland, the residential sector acting chairman of the ACT Master Builders Association, accused the Land Development Authority of effectively indulging in social engineering by cutting back on the proportion of stand alone house blocks and ramping up their prices.

He said young couples, forced into units due to the lack of affordable alternatives, were putting off having children until their circumstances improved and they could transition into a house with its own backyard.

"Since Jon Stanhope ceased to be chief minister [in 2011] the ACT government has stopped focusing on providing free-standing accommodation for first home buyers," he said. "Within the space of less than a third of a generation Canberra first home buyers have been stripped of choice."

Mr Stanhope, a long term advocate for affordable houses, not just flats and units, on social equity grounds, entered the policy debate this week by accusing his successors of freezing 40 per cent of ACT families out of the hope of ever owning a free standing home.

He said the housing affordability program he oversaw from its inception from 2006 to 2008 until his departure three years later had effectively failed due to a lack of political will and the inexplicable inability of senior public servants to do their jobs despite being guaranteed all the necessary resources.

The most glaring failure was the apparent abandonment of the commitment to the creation of a "perpetual land bank" of at least 1000 build ready house blocks to be available for sale over the counter.

"There is not even a single block of land available over the counter today," he said.

The former chief minister, who said he wasn't going to stay silent on the issue but does not plan a return to politics, finds it remarkable the monopoly supplier doesn't have any build ready blocks for sale in a jurisdiction where, according to Mr Barr, there is sufficient land to meet anticipated demand for the next 60 years. "You will create and generate demand [by failing to create supply]," he said. "It will have a significant effect on price."

This situation seems set to get worse before it gets better given the emphasis on units in the 16,900 "dwelling site" releases proposed for the next four years.

Only 4900, or less than a third, are for free standing houses. The balance is for units [10,000] and townhouses [2000].

The issue of revenue remains the elephant in the room with the ACT government's land reserves easily its largest asset and most promising ongoing source of revenue.

Zelkjo Pekic, a Gungahlin-based house designer with 28-years experience in the ACT, recently said the powers-that-be were deliberately inflating the per metre price of land by reducing block sizes and not releasing land in a timely fashion.

This was illustrated by a 141 per cent jump in the asking price of small blocks at Gungahlin in just over five years at a time when housing prices had only gone up by 12 per cent.

Mr Pekic, who said most blocks had been 700 square metres or above when he started designing homes almost 30 years ago, argued the government made a lot more money selling two 150 sq m blocks than it did a 300 sq m block or a 500 sq m block.

While admitting sustainable development is a challenging balancing act, Mr Stanhope believes the shift in emphasis is more about money than the environment.

He said he was "not enamoured" of suburbs of houses cheek-by-jowl and the impact such developments had on the landscape.

"Some suburbs are quite horrible," he said. "It's horrible design, It's horrible aspect and I can't believe we are delivering good outcomes in some areas."

Canberrans don't have to drive far to see his point and, unless current policies are revisited, the affordability and visual outlook will only deteriorate.