Tim The Yowie Man searches for Canberra’s own leaning tower

The Canberra Times

Canberra Times columnist Tim The Yowie Man dives into all things leaning in the region.

Transcript

00:00 One of the more unusual questions I've received lately

00:03 is does the Canberra region have its very own leaning tower

00:07 of Pisa or equivalent?

00:10 And while the short answer is no,

00:13 the region does have a surprising number of leaning things,

00:18 including this tower behind me.

00:21 More about that one later.

00:23 First, check out this hoop pine in Belmore Park in Goulburn,

00:28 which has earned the nickname as the leaning tree of Goulburn.

00:32 Council arborists regularly check

00:35 the vertically challenged pine for safety

00:37 and report that the lean is currently stable

00:40 at about 16 and a half degrees off the perpendicular.

00:44 That's a lot more than the leaning tower of Pisa,

00:46 which is only about four degrees off-center.

00:49 Meanwhile, when the symbolic Garden of Australian Dreams

00:52 at the National Museum of Australia

00:54 was created over 20 years ago,

00:56 a number of Italian alder trees

00:59 were planted purposefully on a tilt.

01:02 This was apparently done to represent the displacement

01:05 of some people arriving in Australia

01:08 from the Northern Hemisphere

01:09 and their yearning to return to their homelands.

01:13 Interestingly, over time, in search of light, no doubt,

01:16 the trunks of these trees have begun to straighten.

01:20 Now back to this playground

01:23 in the Canberra suburb of Gordon.

01:25 It was designed and created in the 1990s

01:29 by the Vikings Group,

01:31 a not-for-profit community and sports group

01:34 that wanted to inject some funds and community assets

01:38 into the local suburbs.

01:40 The president of the group at the time said,

01:43 "We're gonna put up a leaning tower

01:46 "because the kids are gonna have fun."

01:48 And that's what they've done for almost three decades.

01:51 In fact, if you walk around the region here in South Canberra

01:55 it's hard to find any kid, or big kid for that matter,

01:59 that hasn't had at least one afternoon of fun

02:02 on the leaning tower of Gordon.

02:05 (upbeat music)

02:08 (upbeat music)

02:10 [BLANK_AUDIO]

Category

Transcript

Recommended