With Floriade, Canberra's most iconic festival, now approaching its 30th year, the time has come to give the event a home of its own.
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In addition to saving the millions of dollars currently spent on erecting the temporary infrastructure for what is essentially a "pop-up" month-long annual festival, this would give the festival a strong foundation on which to grow and evolve in the decades to come.
To continue with the existing arrangement, whereby Floriade takes over much of Commonwealth Park from mid-September to mid-October every spring, is to risk losing it all together.
The current combination of high running costs, said to be $1.25 million a week, and the apparent lack of reinvention and reinvestment that culminated in the 2016 festival being considered a disappointment by many, is unsustainable.
No event, no matter how successful it may have been in the past, can survive the deadly combination of rising costs and falling attendances for long.
Given its heritage, high level of visibility as part of brand Canberra and past success as a major visitor drawcard for the ACT, Floriade is too important to let wither on the vine.
While it remains the most successful floral themed festival in the southern hemisphere with annual attendances well to the north of 450,000 people and a visitor spend estimated at more than $40 million, there is no shortage of challengers with similar events in other capital cities growing in size and popularity year-on-year.
Our event, which was first held in 1988 as part of the bicentenary year, was originally envisaged as a one-off celebration of the city's 75th birthday.
While the adoption of a new theme for each successive festival has made every Floriade different to the last, there is a view it has begun to lose its mojo.
A recent online straw poll conducted by this newspaper found only 19 per cent of the 133 respondents felt that Floriade was fine and should be left as it is.
Another 22 per cent said it should be spread throughout the city with nine per cent saying it should be moved to its own site such as the Arboretum, Glebe Park, the Yarramundi Reach or elsewhere.
More than a quarter said Floriade should widen its focus to showcase other Canberra highlights such as our food, wine and arts cultures and 23 per cent of respondents said there was a strong case for combining Floriade and Enlighten into the one event.
While this was not, in any way, a scientifically conducted study, the poll does suggest a significant proportion of those who care about Floriade believe it needs a shot in the arm.
An obvious way to do this would be to create a dedicated site on which permanent infrastructure could be established and which would provide a solid basis on which to plan and build for the future.
