The relentless rise of tall towers appears set to encroach on the doorstep of Melbourne's famed Queen Victoria Market.
A row of shops and warehouses steeped in as much history as the market itself, which has been owned by the same family for 103 years and only sold once before, has been listed for sale.
"I've been approached by every agent in Melbourne for 50 years," the site's part-owner, Robert Munro, 87, said about his decision to sell.
Mr Munro and his family's sprawling landholding on the corner of Queen and Therry streets will be one of city's most hotly contested development sites.
"With huge street frontages and enormous size, the property is a developer's dream," said Savills Australia selling agent Clinton Baxter.
"We expect the property to sell for at least $60 million."
It stretches across 6462 square metres of old red-brick shops and warehouses leased to a variety of traders, including an Asian supermarket, antique shop and the original Mr Burger outlet.
The low-rise buildings overlook the street buskers, bustling clothing stands and vegetable stalls near the Elizabeth Street end of the famous shopping destination.
Footsore tourists and regular shoppers are frequent visitors to one particular venue on the site, the Mercat Cross Hotel on Munro's Corner.
Mr Munro's grandfather, a coach builder from Edinburgh, brought the vast landholding from McEwen's Hardware Co in 1911.
"It's only the second time it will have been sold since 1860," he said.
The family took early advantage of the surge of interest in motor vehicles, assembling and selling the then-popular Clement-Bayard cars on the site.
For much of its recent history, it has hosted a variety of tenants.
One building, now occupied by a McDonald's on Elizabeth Street, was sold by the Munros in 1989.
Any development of the site would have to contend with Melbourne City Council's "precinct renewal" project for the market area. That includes ideas for higher intensity development of the market's extensive car park.
And what about towers on Mr Munro's land?
"You can't stop the sun rising in the morning. Melbourne looks like Hong Kong, it will be prosperous," Mr Munro said.
