It's hard to detect a burning anger or a zeal for change out there on the ground as the election gets under way.
Go to the shopping centres and there are some who say: "What election?" But not many of them.
In this uninterested minority were a bunch of youngish people sitting on chairs in the sun, taking a lunch break from cleaning widows.
"I didn't know there was an election and I don't care. It never seems to affect me," Aaron, 36, said.
"I feel like that," his colleague, Lisa, 23, chipped in.
But then she added: "Maybe we don't realise how good we have it."
Someone who does realise how good we have it is Talia Spooner-Stewart, who has multiple sclerosis and thought Canberra was terrific.
"I wouldn't live in any other country and I wouldn't live in any other city apart from Canberra," she said at the Westfield centre in Woden on Saturday.
She has lived in Houston in the United States and said Canberra was streets ahead of Texas in catering for people like her in wheelchairs.
"We think more about constructing buildings in the right way," she said.
"I think we have it pretty good. I think the government is very quick to rectify issues when they are brought to their attention."
If she had a gripe, it was the north of the city seemed to get more attention than the south, particularly with transport and the light rail.
But her complaint that the north gets the gravy is the exact opposite of that of a public servant sitting nearby in the Woden shopping centre.
He was from Gunghalin but there in the south, he said, because the north was denied facilities.
As a public servant, he wouldn't give his name, but he said he had brought his mother down to visit his father in Canberra Hospital and because of COVID-19, he wasn't allowed to be in the room as well - it's one visitor a day and his mother had priority.
So he was killing time, eating chips and drinking bright green Mountain Dew at the Woden shopping centre.
"All the investment goes into Canberra Hospital. They are over-investing there," he said.
"We definitely need a public health option on the north side so people don't have to drive across-town to access specialist medical services."
He was not happy with the territory government, saying: "I don't think the ACT government is effective in any way, shape or form. And I don't think there's any great hope from the major parties or from the minor parties."
He thought Canberra's prosperity was not because of good government but good fortune.
"I don't think it matters who is governing us. We are very lucky that we are a reasonably prosperous society because of the amount of Commonwealth public servants here," he said.
The view the current election would not change much was common.
David Cruise knew the parties had different policies and in that sense the election mattered - but he didn't feel it would actually make much difference "because we are a territory and not a state".
Outside the Westfield centre, the taxis were doing a brisk trade, ferrying people home from the shops and food court.
Driver Tony Gerade had one big wish from whoever formed the next government: put Uber on the same playing field as taxis.
Mr Gerade said an Uber driver could get a licence for $100 whereas he had to pay $8400 for his.
"The odds are stacked in their favour," he said from his cab.
Who might change the rules? "We might have a chance with the Liberals," he said.
Then he mentioned the Australian Climate Change Justice Party. He had a lot of time for its leader, Petar Johnson.
It turned out Mr Johnson was Mr Gerade's boss.
