Imagine if the equivalent roads bureaucracy of 1915 had tried to tell the original marchers they couldn’t use the road if it had a certain speed limit or if they weren’t accompanied by a full emergency response team.

Yes, precautions will need to be taken because cars these days travel a lot faster than they did a century ago. And, yes, some rules will need to be applied but not so many that the event loses its entire meaning.

Next year will be important in our coming of age as a nation. It will carry more meaning than, for instance, the Olympic Torch Relay, which saw highways and byways around the nation thronged with onlookers. 

The Waratah March re-enactment won’t even come close to that in numbers or scale so to stifle it in bureaucratic red tape seems beyond unreasonable. Particularly galling is the suggestion the march will not be able to cross the Old Nowra Bridge or stop to create the original photograph that was taken in 1915.

We are well used to delays on the bridge when oversized loads are trucked down the highway so a delay for the Waratah marchers should not be a problem.

We expect the NSW government to do its utmost to convince Roads and Maritime Services to do its utmost to make the re-enactment a success rather than place countless hurdles in its past. 

The Anzac spirit cannot be allowed to be suffocated by pen pushers.