In 1968 Canberra had a great entrance. What happened?

Driving in from Sydney the wide tree-lined highway, with neat new houses set back on a service road impressed from the start.

When I got to Dickson, Northbourne Avenue opened before me like a jewel. Large healthy eucalypts set in green manicured lawns lined the dual carriageway and median. It was a city entrance like no other.

Modern, award winning, two and three storey public housing units, graced with well-placed trees, shrubs and lawn, showed the vibrance and hope of a new age for urban living.

Later, when I moved here as a graduate engineer, I often sat in meetings in the NCDC building over-awed by the quality of the planners, architects, landscape designers and engineers. These leading professionals were building a national capital that would make the nation proud and put Australia at the forefront of urban planning.

Sadly, all that began to crumble with self-government. Today when you arrive, the trees are gone, the median strip is concrete, and ugly tram wires have replaced the soft dappled leaves of the eucalypts.

Those award-winning public housing units were bull-dozed and sold off to developers by a local government more interested in money than people and urban design.

Instead of a modern, world-leading example of urban design, Canberra now has the same chaos of concrete, clutter and confusion that can be found along Sydney Road in Melbourne or Parramatta Road in Sydney.

Oliver Raymond (Letters, May 14), I would easily manage an overnight 300km trip to Parkes in my Hyundai Kona electric car. On the previous day, I'd plug into an ordinary power point at home to make sure I had a full charge in the morning.

Then I would drive to Parkes without any need to charge. I'd arrive with well over 100km of range left. In Parkes, there is a fast DC charger that would have the car back to 80 per cent in less than an hour. Alternatively, I could add 200km of range from an ordinary power point where I was staying overnight. If I wanted a toilet or coffee or meal break on either leg of the journey I could stop in Yass or Cowra where there are also fast DC chargers and plug in for a partial top-up charge.

Otherwise, I would have enough range to just drive straight home. These chargers work with every electric car currently sold new.

I can assure John Madelly snr the proposed destruction of the London Circuit and Commonwealth Avenue intersection has raised more than a murmur within the ranks of The Canberra Times readers. I raised the matter on March 26 but my letter went unpublished.

The damage to the city's road infrastructure that this unnecessary project will cause should be of serious concern to everyone. Especially as it being carried out solely to allow the already outdated light rail to proceed to Commonwealth Park and later, perhaps, to Woden.

The use of flexible electric buses for Woden commuters would be a win/win situation for all and prevent the chaos the destruction of this intersection will cause.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg's budget does not make sense from an economic growth, revenue, or deficit perspective. And it does nothing to address the real problem: ballooning government spending on boondoggles and social welfare programs.

Is there anyone in the parliamentary Liberal party who does not share the values of the progressive left, namely, Keynesian direction of the economy and the expansion of the therapeutic welfare state?

The therapeutic welfare state is now firmly entrenched in Australia. Self responsibility and self reliance may soon become a crime.

The situation around the potential eviction of Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah is complicated. Joseph Krauss ("Palestinians fear for loss of homes", canberratimes.com.au, May 13) misses some aspects.

Jewish groups have owned the land in question since as early as 1860. In 1948, Jordan ethnically cleansed all Jews from east Jerusalem, confiscating their land. Jordanian authorities then gave the land to Arabs.

After 1967, when Israel captured east Jerusalem, Israel passed a law that allowed all those who Jordanian authorities had given title to land stolen from Jews to keep it. However land that Jordan had kept the title to, and allowed others to live on, went back to the original Jewish owners, as was the case here.

The Palestinian residents were instead made protected tenants, provided they paid a small rent, which they agreed to do in the 1980s.

They have, however, been refusing to pay that rent, while others with no ties to the land are now simply squatting there, so the owners are trying to evict them and the case is working its way through Israel's court system.

Sadly, a complex legal dispute has been inaccurately portrayed as a Jewish land grab, and is used by Hamas to incite and justify violence.

The ACT's chief planner "will turn to nationally recognised "thought leaders" to help inform future design decisions for Canberra, while also considering lessons the territory can learn from cities overseas" ("Planners look to thought leaders' input," May 9, p4).

Eight years ago, without informing the Minister for Planning, Ponton "simplified" the ACT's planning system by adding more than a hundred new elements to the Territory Plan, giving them the innocuous title of "suburb precinct map", authorising them to permit land uses that would otherwise be prohibited, and authorising them to prohibit land uses that would otherwise be permitted. He also created 19 district precinct maps that cover the entire Territory. Provisions in those can conflict with provisions in the suburb precinct maps. He did not provide a way to resolve such conflicts.

Ponton does not seem to be proud of those changes. Since 2014 he has insisted that he "merely relocated provisions".

Will the "thought leaders" consider lessons the territory can learn from the chief planner's efforts to "simplify" planning laws?

I have noted the case being made by the National Archives to be adequately funded to undertake its statutory role thus protecting our national history for future generations.

I recently accessed my grandfather's numerous pay books from his World War II in digital form to further my discussions with DVA about his possible entitlement to an unissued campaign medal.

The timely response from the NAA was invaluable. The NAA deserves to be adequately funded as highlighted in the Tune Review to in part honour the service of those who risked lives for our country.

At the commemoration of the 76th anniversary of the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany the Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a dire warning by deliberately excluding any mention of US involvement in this massive victory.

Before the dust had yet settled from the atomic explosions on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 all hope of a rapprochement between the two great world powers was already lost.

So incensed was the Kremlin over its loss of strategic parity with the US that by 1949 it had developed its own atomic device, heralding its entry into the nuclear age.

Today, by still insisting that US global hegemony can be defeated with nuclear weapons, President Putin is gambling away our future with the prospect of a nuclear armageddon.

To add to the loss of Australian coal, barley and wine markets in China, the United States has shown how it is able to run a "trade war" with China while looking after its own economic security by resuming visa processing for Chinese students wanting to study in the United States.

According to the South China Morning Post the US embassy in Beijing reported that some 3000 online applications were received in the first hour of this resumption. The embassy said that this "resumption shows that Americans welcome foreign students into our homes or communities or universities".

The Chinese student market (valued at $12 billion to Australia in 2019) does not mean much to Peter Dutton, Mr Morrison and Ms Payne whose ineptitude does not seem to enable them to run their "war" with China while at the same protecting our economic security. Given America's success it is tempting to conclude Australia's actions are being based on xenophobia, jingoism, white supremacism or racism, with the added advantage of continuing this government's attacks on the viability of Australia's public universities

Post-Soviet Russia is an oligarchy running robber capitalism. Why wouldn't Prince Michael of Kent naturally encourage a rapprochement with Britain?

I don't feel safe in a nation led by a person who believes in an imaginary spirit which counsels its followers not to fear worldwide catastrophe because although the end of the world is indeed nigh, its anointed ones will be saved from the conflagration while the remainder perish.

"What kind of country have we become?" asks Fred Pilcher (Letters, May 7). The answer is simple; the wrong type. Perhaps Fred may find donating to "trusted" organisations assisting those fleeing civil war in their own countries (say Syria, Palestine and Myanmar) an edifying experience.

Mokhles k Sidden says that he can only hold his breath for a maximum of 10 seconds (Letters, May 14). I would strongly urge him to consult a specialist respirologist immediately.

Apparently the NSW government has a plan to end the mouse plague. It will cost $50 million and according to the Agriculture Minister is the "equivalent to napalming mice". Here's a better idea. Get the feds to put them all on JobSeeker and starve them to death.

Brian Wenn (Letters, May 15) has my sympathy. Every bottle of wine I buy has a taste of lemon or lime citrus, notes of stone fruits and cardamom or chocolate, succulent tannins and dark berries. For decades, I have searched for one which tastes of alcohol with a flavour reminiscent of grapes. My quest has been "fruitless".

Our cricketers are national treasures and must be treated differently. We allow people with special sports talents to jump immigration queues. I support keeping our borders closed and I urge the media to stop rubbing it in. And, while we are at it, we need to support our ScoMo because Albo would bring us all down.

Acting on "the right to defend itself" by Israel has never resolved the Israeli Palestinian conflict. Israel must address the root causes of the problem.

The retaliation by Israel against Gaza is tragically reminiscent of the overwhelming military response by the occupying German forces to the Warsaw ghetto uprising in 1943.

Why is it the Palestinians have to "pay a high price" for their attacks yet somehow Israel doesn't pay any price for theirs which are 10 times more deadly?

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content:

Email: letters.editor@canberratimes.com.au. Send from the message field, not as an attachment. Fax: 6280 2282. Mail: Letters to the Editor, The Canberra Times, PO Box 7155, Canberra Mail Centre, ACT 2610.

Keep your letter to 250 or fewer words. References to The Canberra Times reports should include date and page number. Letters may be edited. Provide phone number and full home address (suburb only published).