What role does Lake Burley Griffin play in Canberra’s plan?

In the original design for Canberra by Walter Burley Griffin, Lake Burley Griffin serves as a central landscape design feature, created by damming the Molonglo River.12

The lake plays a fundamental role in the city's spatial organization:

• Geometric Focus: The lake acts as an ornamental centerpiece within the east-west Molonglo floodplain, providing a visual and structural anchor for the city’s layout.1
• Land Axis: It facilitates a critical north-south land axis that connects Mount Ainslie in the north to Parliament House on Capital Hill in the south.3
• Urban Integration: The parliamentary triangle and the city's primary government and commercial centers are situated on either side of the lake, utilizing the water as a defining boundary for the central district.13
• Open Space: The foreshores of the lake have been preserved as open space, consistent with the broader planning policy to maintain natural areas and separate urban districts.3