Professor Saint has judged that not only is the design of the towers failing, but they are being put in the wrong place - a similar problem being experienced in London. "What is common between the two cities is that they would be better if they were better placed. And the is cat is out of the bag in both cities," he said. "If the city had been courageous enough to say, 'We've got a new Docklands area, we're developing on Southbank and let's put all our high buildings in those places,' then I think you could have had visual coherence. "There are people who say they're not interested in visual coherence, that's a bit old fashioned... but if you like areas of a certain scale, then you've rather lost it now in central Melbourne." Professor Saint, general editor of the Survey of London - described as the official history of London's buildings - said architects were under pressure from developers to produce buildings as cheaply as possible.

He said it had become clear from speakers at the conference there was a lack of clarity in the rules, but he believed it was not too late for the city. "If you don't draw some line, if you don't have some set of rules, it will become even more dominant than it is already. Politicians need to be a bit more courageous about where they have these big buildings." In a paper on the failure to recognise Melbourne's 1960s buildings, Philip Goad, a professor of architecture at the University of Melbourne, warned that Melbourne's current drive for high density seemed to be at any cost. "It's great that central Melbourne is thriving but it does appear that we have no current vision for our city's ideal physical form," he said. He strongly criticised plans for the National Mutual Centre site on Collins Street, where the 1960s building is being demolished and a plaza at front lost.

Professor Goad said the proposal to build a tower more than 200 metres tall that would overshadow the Yarra and the historic Customs House effectively broke all the cardinal rules in place since 1982 and potentially set a precedent for similar developments. The building should not be allowed to overshadow the Yarra at all, he said. "That it is even being countenanced beggars belief." He said Melbourne had the opportunity to retain its rich mix of heritage buildings and spaces from all the decades of its development. But he likened the city to Don Draper in the TV series Mad Men, looking out wistfully from his 1960s office, contemplating his imminent fall from grace. "I think Melbourne is about to do the same," he said, arguing it needed to take stock and pause before it was too late. "Otherwise, its fall will be irrevocable and, like Mad Men, Melbourne's 1960s city will be the stuff of tragic nostalgia rather than an intrinsic and visible part of its ongoing and necessary history." Fairfax Media was a media partner of the University of Melbourne Urban Heritage Conference.