Canberra's pop-up suburbs, some of which are now being built vertically instead of in the horizontal, and the glitzy mini-sky scrapers under consideration for Civic and Canberra's town centres, have already demonstrated sufficient shock and awe to obscure fond memories of quieter and simpler times.
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With the ageing of the members of Merv Knowles' generation long lasting links with this city's bucolic, family and community focussed past are beginning to rust away and disappear.
Mr Knowles was the 94-year-old living treasure The Canberra Times interviewed last week and who has been a regular at the Manuka Pool since it opened for business in 1931.
Mr Knowles's story was worth telling for two reasons. The first was his whole-of-life experience in Canberra spans almost the entire history of its growth, development and change. The second was that his tale focussed attention on the challenges heritage advocates are encountering in getting iconic facilities such as the Manuka Pool added to or updated on the ACT Heritage Register.
The slow-moving heritage bureaucracy problem is not a new one and, if it drags on much longer, may be worthy of consideration for a special listing of its own.
Peak turbidity was reached in 2008 when a whopping 320 "nominated places or objects" were waiting to have their merits assessed.
While that figure had, according to the ACT government, dropped to 136 at the end of June in 2016, this is hardly an outstanding outcome.
There would appear to be a serious risk at least some well-loved Canberra icons may fall foul of the wrecker's ball before the heritage listing or the conservation management plan that would have preserved them is brought into force or updated from an original determination that may have been made years ago.
That fear is exercising the minds of members of organisations such as the Kingston and Barton Residents Group who appreciate the simple community treasures that have survived. They have sought to have listings for the Manuka Pool, Telopea Park and the Manuka Oval Precinct to be updated to take into account their social significance as well as architectural and aesthetic considerations.
The ACT government can't say when this will happen.
The Manuka Pool, as Mr Knowles said, is as full of memories as it is of water. He was among the first of several generations to spend endless summers breathing air thick with chlorine, plummeting off the old diving tower and burning themselves red raw in the afternoon sun.
Community "happy places" such as this are a vital part of Canberra's history and, as such, need to be celebrated and preserved.
