"Ruined & wrecked," I replied.
Swamp Dwelling CERA behind CBD SMF-cordons opened a niche in its occupied red-zone-CBD for public to see some of ruined High St & ruined Hereford St from Hereford St / High St / Colombo St crossing. CERA minister Brownlee recently said Christchurch red-zone-CBD was no longer red-zone but rebuild zone!
Hereford St: Since Leah & I'd last trekked that way, opposite the Ibis Hotel the astroturf soccer pitch was gone. The red-zone ruin on Colombo St at the pitch's end was gone, demolished.
Hereford St / High St / Colombo St crossing: Northwards a block was gone, demolished: IBM & ANZ. From Hereford St SMF-cordon, we looked straight into abandoned public toilets through their glass walls & straight into Cathedral Sq to CERA's porta-cabin offices. Christ Church Cathedral ruin was obscured by trees. A messy demolition-site had an orange-digger parked on rubble. We saw a deep concrete- foundation trench & saw steel-girders stacked on the demolition-site. SMF-cordons were everywhere, some with attached ROAD CLOSED signs.
30.03.13. Hereford St view, red zone, IBM demolition site. Cathedral Sq, closed public toilets left, CERA porta-cabin offices beyond
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Hereford St view, red zone, demolition sites: IBM & ANZ. Red zone, abandoned bldgs beyond, left to right: Forsyth Barr / Crowne Plaza Hotel, Camelot Hotel, Christ Church Cathedral behind trees, Novotel, Pacific Tower / Rendezvous Hotel. Camelot Hotel would be demolished for the Central Library / Turanga rebuild
30.03.13. Hereford St view, ANZ demolition site. Red zone, abandoned Camelot Hotel middle, Christchurch Cathedral behind trees. Camelot Hotel would be demolished for the Central Library / Turanga rebuild
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Hereford St / Colombo St crossing view, red zone, ruined Christ Church Cathedral behind trees
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. High St / Colombo St / Hereford St view, demolition sites, reopened Ibis Hotel left, red zone, abandoned telecom middle. Abandoned, glass fronted, public toilets below, Cathedral Sq. Government Life awaited demolition right
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. High St / Colombo St / Hereford St crossing view, ANZ demolition site. Cathedral Sq, red zone, Government Life awaited demolition beyond. Chalice right
Hereford St / Colombo St: Multi-storey BNZ ghost was part-demolished. Not even CERA would complete the demolishing of asbestos- riddled BNZ! Decades hence, would Christchurch citizens have asbestosis after imbibing asbestos, or silicosis from imbibed concrete dust during quake-years? BNZ part-demolition would be abandoned until complete demolition in 2017. Spark multi-storey offices would be built on site in 2019.
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. BNZ demolition in progress, Colombo St / Hereford St. After CERA's part demolition, BNZ would stand abandoned until complete demolition, 2017. Spark multi-storey office bldg would be built on site, 2019
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Colombo St / Hereford St / High St crossing view, BNZ demolition in progress left, Hanafins demolition site right. After CERA's part demolition, BNZ would stand abandoned until complete demolition, 2017. Spark multi-storey office bldg would be built on site, 2019
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Flour Power sculpture, red zone, Colombo St / High St. The sculpture would survive the quakes
30.03.13. ROAD CLOSED. Steel mesh fence cordon. Colombo St / Hereford St / High St crossing, S view, red zone, Colombo St. Demolition sites both sides of street
High St: We trekked past Hanafins demolition-site, past KFC demolition-site, past dusty ghost-shops with fading USAR / TF graffiti on windows & glass doors. Beyond the SMF-cordon, we saw a vast demolition-site bordered by High St, Cashel St, Colombo St to Restart Cashel Mall by The Crossing. Two skips stood behind the SMF-cordon. On the south-side of Cashel St we saw ghosts: one a demolition in progress. We saw yellow-diggers parked nearby.
The vast demolition-site would become ANZ Centre part of Brownlee's vaunted rebuild. But we would wait four years till 2017 for ANZ Centre to be completed.
30.03.13. SE view, recently opened, red zone High St. All bldgs were quake closed for 2 years, so far
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. High St view, Cashel St red zone, demolition sites & abandoned bldgs. The Crossing on right of white bldg. The demo site would become ANZ Centre, completed 2017
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Two yellow diggers. Westpac demolition site, High St / Cashel St red zone
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Holiday Inn demolition site left, Westpac demolition site right, High St / Cashel St red zone
High St: Dust everywhere, on the ground & coating ruins & in the air. CERA had stopped laying dust with water-tankers. High St was gritty with dust as we walked along the middle tram-line. Pedestrians viewed ruins, taking it all in, others like me snapped. A couple of cars churned dust while driving to the end of the SMF-cordon. Our mouths, skin, & hair became covered in gritty paste.
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Holiday Inn demolition site, High St / Cashel St red zone
At the end of High St SMF-cordon, we stared at multi-storey Westpac demolition-site & a rubble-heap on multi-storey Holiday Inn demolition-site. Last time we'd trekked that way, more than two years before, New Year 2010-11 post Boxing Day Quake, buildings were alive then. We'd sat on a High St bench viewing high-rises: Wespac, Holiday Inn, Hotel Grand Chancellor, all gone. Heap of twisted rebars lay on Hotel Grand Chancellor rubble. 2016. Multi-storey Grand Central Building would be completed on site.
For the last two years, public was banned from red-zone-CBD by Civil Defence then CERA, by means of SMF-cordons & NZDF-checkpoints. All that remained: a sanitized quakescape, dusty demolition-sites, abandoned buildings & ruins.
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. Demolition site, abandoned bldg, High St / Cashel St red zone. Hotel Grand Chancellor demolition site behind. 2016. Multi-storey, Grand Central Building would be completed on site
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. High St view, red zone, Hotel Grand Chancellor demolition site. 2016. Multi-storey, Grand Central Building would be completed on site
30.03.13. NW view, recently opened, red zone High St. All bldgs were quake closed for 2 years, so far
High St: We trekked past Avonmore Tertiary Institute due to open on Tuesday. Dusty, little rebuild still! 2018. Avonmore would go into liquidation.
30.03.13. Avonmore Tertiary Institute due for post quake opening, High St red zone. 2018. Avonmore would go into liquidation
30.03.13. USAR / TF graffiti on shop window, red zone, High St
30.03.13. Remains of red zone, abandoned Hanafins, High St / Hereford St
Hereford St: We trekked past ruins to the SMF-cordon. Man's Bakery & Cafe: we saw furniture still jumbled by the 22 February 2011 Quake over two years before. Dry buns lay in glass cabinets on the bakery counter. A cup of unfinished coffee was on a table. On another table we saw a paper cup abandoned in haste two years before! We saw white plates lying smashed on the floor. Dust was so thick on the bakery windows it blurred my pics, so I wiped tacky dust away with my palm before taking fresh pics. We saw tableaux like that all over Christchurch during quake-years.
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. E view, recently opened, red zone, Hereford St. All bldgs were quake closed for 2 years, so far
30.03.13. Quake closed, Man's Bakery & Cafe, Hereford St red zone
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. W view, recently opened red zone, Hereford St. Flour Power sculpture left, Central Police high rise beyond, recently opened Ibis Hotel right. Most red zone bldgs were quake closed for 2 years, so far. Central Police would be imploded 30.05.15. Flour Power sculpture would survive the quakes
30.03.13. Avonmore Tertiary Institute due for post quake opening, Hereford St, red zone. 2018. Avonmore would be liquidated
Hereford St: We looked through a SMF-cordon at PEETO ghost. Pre-quakes, an expat friend taught ESOL to foreign students there. We passed Asian restaurant ghosts & saw fading USAR / TF graffiti on windows, all behind SMF-cordons.
30.03.13. Steel mesh fence cordon. E view, red zone, abandoned bldgs, Hereford St
30.03.13. ROAD CLOSED. Steel mesh fence cordon. Abandoned PEETO, red zone, Hereford St
30.03.13. USAR / TF graffiti on abandoned, coffee shop window, red zone, Hereford St
30.03.13. Blue, plastic, water pipe. Steel mesh fence cordoned, abandoned shop, red zone, Hereford St
Restart Cashel Mall: We trekked past a Baby Austen parked outside tourist trap, Quake City, Baby Austen rides pricey. In Quake City foyer a clock culled from a ruin was stopped at 12:51, the exact time the 22 February 2011 Quake hit. We observed the startling contrast between sanitized Quake City & grey, dusty red-zone ghosts. Quake City's side-wall was repainted with garish patterns & colours, so-called street-art, like tagging.
30.03.13. Quake City & Baby Austen, Restart Cashel Mall. See 12:51 stopped clock, time when the 22.02.11 quake hit
30.03.13. Demolition site, repainted wall, Quake City, Restart Cashel Mall
Ferry Rd: I bumpily drove over temporary Ferrymead Bridge. The main Ferrymead Bridge was a demolition-in-progress: two temporary side-bridges before rebuild.
McCormacks Bay Causeway: Post 11 000 quakes, the Causeway was still a bumpy mess. I drove to Sumner beach, as we wanted to see a stranded yacht, which was washed-up days before near stunted Shag Rock. We wandered Sumner beach below Clifton's ruined-houses looming atop the cliff. Two layers of shipping-containers below protected Peacocks Gallop traffic from cliff-fall.
30.03.13. Sumner beach view, quake ruined, cliff top housing, Clifton. Stacked shipping containers below, protecting Peacocks Gallop traffic from rock fall
The wrecked yacht lay on its side. The cabin was fire-blackened, the plastic-roof was melted. The porthole glass was shattered. A rusty anchor-chain hung in low-tide water, anchor gone. We smelt charred cabin.
30.03.13. Fire damaged, stranded yacht, washed up on Sumner Beach
Two years & seven months post 4 September 2010 Quake & more than two years post 22 February 2010 Quake, Christchurch was still ruined & wrecked. Little rebuilt so far, despite CERA minister Brownlee's rebuild spin.
*Trekked Hereford St, High St, Restart Cashel Mall, Peacocks Gallop. 63 images.
Tuesday-Wednesday 02-03.04.13 One News: 270 red zone residents didn't take up CERA's offer. It was their choice to live in quaked-housing with no road repairs, no rubbish removal, no water, sewage & electricity services & still pay mortgages & rates on post-quake, uninsurable, residential properties. By the final deadline for red-zoners, about 98%, 6 612 red zoners would accept CERA's offers. They took insurers' money, restarting their lives elsewhere. Never mind One News figures 6 612 + 270 didn't reconcile with CERA's December 2012 figure, 7 860 red-zone residential properties (Greater Christchurch Recovery Update, Issue 16, Dec 2012).
The problem with CERA's red-zone offers was that CERA red-zoned land making it uninhabitable by NZ National government decree. That interfered with the post-quake housing market by not allowing red-zoners to only negotiate with insurers. So far, NZ National government / CERA hadn't said what it would do with residential red-zone properties it took.
Like ourselves, not all Christchurch residents owned residential property. We paid rents & landlords benefitted because tenants paid landlords' mortgages, insurances, rates, property maintenance via rents. Never mind tenants benefitting landlords by doing free gardening. Over many years as Christchurch residents, we paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in rents, never earning enough to save for residential property ownership, nor get ahead, as Christchurch wages / salaries were low. Renters endured quakes just like whinging red-zone property owners did!
The 2011-2012 public protests I attended, I witnessed a lot of red-zoners' whining. Example: Some Brooklands red-zoners who loudly protested, but took CERA's red-zone offer. At 2012 protests, I saw that most red-zoner protesters were welfare-state baby-boomers, who'd bought their red- zoned properties when houses were cheaper & mortgages lower. They also had free tertiary education.
Coda:
The Press 04.04.13. Christ Church Cathedral saga continued: The Anglican diocese released three designs for a new Christ Church Cathedral, for public consultation:
1. Slow, expensive, quake-unsafe Gothic Revival restoration.
2. Slow, expensive, quake-safe Gothic Revival rebuild.
3. Quick, cheap, quake-safe modern rebuild.
Protesters like the Wizard, Anderton, Burdon, Belton wanted to restore dangerous Christ Church Cathedral. (2019. The astronomically expensive rebuild outcome would be spun as "Reinstatement"). The Press aided their wishes by publishing distance pics of Christ Church Cathedral, which didn't show closeup damage. No way could aerial pics show closeup damage to masonry. Foundation & interior damages was anyone's guess, as ruined Christ Church Cathedral would stay fence-cordoned for years. Public banned!
August 2019. While I was wandering the CBD, a Chinese tourist & his family wandered Cathedral Junction. Presenting his cell-phone to me & pointing to Christ Church Cathedral on its Google map, he asked me where Christ Church Cathedral was. I showed him the way, telling him the front of Christ Church Cathedral was a fence-cordoned mess!
Content & pics Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.
See Red zoners who rejected offers still in limbo (The Press / Stuff Co).
See Final Cathedral design options unveiled (The Press / Stuff Co).
See Cathedral Square to get first new office building since earthquakes (The Press / Stuff Co).
See ANZ Centre, Cashel St.
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