When Australia chooses a federal capital, Sydney and Melbourne are two difficult candidates to decide. The compromise is not simply to crown the most important city. It plans to build a new capital.
The National Museum of Australia explains that the Parliament sits provisionally in Melbourne, while the future site is to be in New South Wales, at least one hundred miles from Sydney. The name Canberra was announced on March 12, 1913.
History reminds us that a capital is first and foremost a political and institutional decision. It can be designed to represent a whole rather than to reward an already dominant city. What seems obvious today on a map is therefore the result of a choice, a compromise and a construction site: a nation had to start by imagining the place from which it would govern itself.
What we know
Capital choice and chronology; no current unverified demographic ranking.
To go to the source
References consulted on September 21, 2026. Linked pages may be in another language.
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