Careful reconstruction essential

BY DAVID KILLICK

Once the initial shock has worn off and frayed nerves calm down - which will take some time - the need will come for a careful evaluation of how the central parts of Christchurch should be rebuilt.

And it must be a calm, balanced, thorough, and systematic approach. Otherwise, Christchurch's heritage will be lost forever, experts warn. Historic Places Trust board member and heritage expert Anna Crighton says it is the old buildings that give Christchurch its special character.

Already the Government has proposed rushing through legislation to permit rebuilding work without building consents, which will be issued later.

"What we don't want is the bureaucratic process holding back the restoration process," Prime Minister John Key said yesterday.

Fair enough. But where does it stop? Which buildings will be restored, and which ones will be knocked down and redeveloped?

"During the post-disaster phase, we don't want to see the unnecessary and untimely and hasty demolition of historic heritage as a result of poor management decisions, poor advice or even perceived opportunities to dispose of unwanted buildings," Crighton says.

"This is Christchurch's heritage; it is all our heritage."

We were so lucky no lives were lost in the earthquake - due to the timing of the tremor and stringent building regulations.

It was also amazing at least 80 per cent (that figure is provisional) of the city's buildings remain intact. Most have suffered little damage.

On the other side of the police and army cordons, the central city looks eerie indeed, with few people, no cars, and businesses closed - but major damage has been confined to only some buildings.

That is not the impression most television viewers will have received.

We were flooded with overseas emails from people believing 80 per cent of the city had been destroyed. Looking at the television pictures of rubble, one could be forgiven for thinking that most of Christchurch's population lived in old masonry multi-storey buildings.

Yes, the damage is extensive - homes, buildings, and businesses have been lost - but looking at some suburbs, you would never know anything major had occurred.

The worst-hit buildings were unreinforced masonry, double or triple brick, in the inner city.

Oamaru-based architect Peter Myers, who has extensive overseas experience restoring badly damaged buildings, mostly in Australia, says many buildings can be restored.

"It's very hard for a natural event to completely destroy a building. You destroy buildings by letting bulldozers over them," Myers says.

Following the devastation of World War II, some badly bombed cities, such as Vienna, were rebuilt from the original materials in the original style. London's Docklands, a bomb-damaged zone as late as the 1960s, eventually became one of the city's priciest areas.

"In the case of Berlin, the real damage followed when developers moved in and removed all traces of the historic city.

"This is what hasn't been appreciated: how much cultural and emotional value is tied up in these buildings in Christchurch," Myers says.

"Their hasty removal and destruction is a trauma in the making."

Myers says tension rods can be put into the floor structure to strengthen buildings, and facades can be put back up.

"No-one is going to take out the railway lines or roads; they are going to fix them.

"This destruction may appear dramatic now, but with careful reconstruction it will disappear."

However, many old buildings in the central city, especially along Manchester St, were already badly neglected, shabby and tatty. Many were empty, with "for lease" signs. "Is the inner city dying?" an Indian restaurant owner asked me a couple of months ago.

Only a few weeks ago, Mayor Bob Parker acknowledged the city centre needed revitalising.

Well, it will certainly get action now. But the question remains: Should buildings be rebuilt in the same style? Especially if they were shabby anyway. Old, yes, but not historic or special. Or were they just badly in need of a spruce up? There are fears some building owners will be secretly pleased they can go ahead and bowl buildings, or seek to buy up a whole block and redevelop.

Some architects fear we will have an influx of cheaply constructed, sharp-angled international architecture, bland and lacking in character.

Other architects will see the earthquake as a great opportunity to revitalise the city centre and build new, exciting, modern buildings.

Why, according to this view, should we be enslaved by the past? Napier rebuilt itself in the wake of the 1931 earthquake in the latest art deco style. Why shouldn't Christchurch have buildings of a new design?

My own view is it would be good to have some of both, but that we need a reasoned debate. Unusually, the Christchurch public can now have a say, but time might be short.

Some controversial decisions will have to be revisited.

For example, who would want to be in an underground bus station during an earthquake?

* David Killick is the editor of At Home in The Press.

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