CERA Landcheck website, land status of Avonside Dr, Avondale:
126 properties, 21 green zone, 105 red zone, 83% red zone. Thus home owners of most of that section of Avonside Dr, by Avon River, had to leave their houses, restarting elsewhere.
25.01.12. Quake sunk Avondale Rd Bridge abutment, post 23.12.11 quake swarm. The abutment would be fixed 2012-2013
Avondale Rd Bridge: Snapped bridge damage, where a concrete bridge abutment on the river bank leaned at an odd angle, causing traffic sloping when crossing the bridge. Quakes caused the bridge abutment to sink into Avon River mud. I'd seen that damage to several Avon River bridges. As Council was responsible for fixing infrastructure, when would Council would get around to fixing bridge damages? The abutment would be fixed by SCIRT, 2012-2013.
Council sign near Avondale Rd Bridge:
Stronger Christchurch
Permanent sewer and road reconstruction
Avondale Road and surrounds
Expect delays next 2 km
July 2011 - April 2012
Thank you for your patience...
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake
Avonside Dr: Red zone, ghost houses by Avon River, overgrown gardens. Some houses were leaning, tilted, sunk into grey quakemire. Every house along Avonside Dr, from Avondale Rd to Porritt Park cnr, by Kerrs Reach, was red zoned by CERA.
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Grey portaloo, blue water pipe, liquefaction mud, green, plastic, sewage tank, red zone Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
Some houses were inhabited, one property had people living in a front yard caravan. Some home owners kept up appearances with neat gardens. I snapped some house demolition sites.
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
Trekked past weedy, quakemired driveways, junked: tyre; wheelbarrow; suitcase; aluminium cans; paper cups, plastic security tape, metal... Many garage door bases were sunk in mud. Trekked muddy, dusty pavements, passed warped gates, some locked. Passed skewed letterboxes, green or black, plastic, sewage tanks, colourful portaloos, blue water pipes, half buried in grey quakemire.
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Orange, plastic, road cones, steel mesh fence cordon. Post Feb 22 quake, raised Avon River stopbank, red zone Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake slumped Avon River bank, red zone Avonside Dr. New Brighton Rd on opp bank, post 23.12.11 Xmas Quake Swarm. Slumping due to lateral spreading.
Kerrs Reach rowers trained on sewage polluted Avon River: some single kayaks, some single sculls, double sculls, couple of big boats with 4 rowers & cox per boat. Two coaches cycled on the stopbank, calling on loudhailers. What infectious substances did rowers & coaches absorb from sewage?
25.01.12. Double sculls training, Kerrs Reach, Avon River, seen from Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
After 17 months of quakes, Council needed to pull-finger, as eastern suburb ratepayers were living in dusty, muddy, portaloo squalor, while councillors squabbled.
25.01.12. Green, plastic, sewage tank. Quake damaged, red zone housing & caravan, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake cracked & slumped Avon River bank, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm. New Brighton Rd on opp bank. Cracking & slumping due to lateral spreading
Across Avon River, I saw sandbags beside New Brighton Rd, near Horseshoe Lake outlet, where the road had sunk below river level. A small digger & truck were parked by roadside repairs on Avon River bank near Burwood School. (2014. Burwood School would merge with Windsor School, revamped school named Waitakiri Primary School, Burwood Rd: New premises, 2016.)
25.01.12. Red zone, Avonside Dr view, scullers on Avon River by Horseshoe Lake outlet. Sandbags on opp bank, New Brighton Rd, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, Avonside Dr view, blue digger, white truck on New Brighton Rd by Avon River, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
Avonside Dr: Cracked, potholed, barely fixed in places with tarseal patches & shingle. Along Avonside Dr, the post 22.02.11 Killer Quake raised, stopbank on Avon River bank had hardened, forming a stony wall.
25.01.12. Red zone Avonside Dr view, 4 rowers & cox, Kerrs Reach, Avon River, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Slumped concrete bench. Red zone, Avonside Dr view, quake slumped Avon River bank, post 23.12.11 quake swarm. New Brighton Rd on opp bank.
25.01.12. Red zone, liquefactioned, Avonside Dr cnr. Avon River raised stopbank behind, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Liquefactioned, red zone house, blue water pipe, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
Below the stopbank, Avon River bank had slumped, with deep cracks, in places 1m wide, more than 1m deep. Slumping, cracking, due to lateral spreading. River rubbish & tilted benches on concrete slabs lay higgledy-piggledy on the trashed riverbank. Ducks & black swans swam in sewage polluted Avon River.
25.01.12. Slumped concrete benches. Avonside Dr, red zone, stopbank view, quake slumped, Avon River bank, kayakers & rowers, post 23.12.11 Xmas Quake swarm. Locksley Ave on opp bank
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, house demolition site, quake damaged house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, Avonside Dr, stopbank view, quake slumped Avon River bank, Kerrs Reach, post 23.12.11 quake swarm. Locksley Ave on opp bank
Considering how solid concrete & / or iron & wooden benches & their concrete slab bases where sunk & displaced by quakes, all along Avon River banks, TC3 green / blue zoners were conned by engineers into paying for thicker concrete slab foundations for damaged, house foundations, as concrete slabs hadn't proved effective against serial liquefactions. Those thicker concrete slab, house foundations would still crack, slump or tilt as in previous quakes.
In future, whatever concrete foundations engineers concocted, future quake liquefactions would sink housing, similar to 2010-2011 sinkings, as so much quakemire spurted above ground during quakes, causing land settlement. Simple solution: Stop building on liquefaction prone land! But that was no solace for 28 000 TC3 green zoned properties, subject to more liquefactions in future quakes. Never mind new CBD bldgs to be build on liquefaction prone swampland in the red zone CBD above Christchurch Fault!
25.01.12. Red zone, liquefactioned Avonside Dr / Edna St, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, blue water pipe, Avonside Dr / Edna St, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, tanker spraying water on liquefaction dust, Edna St, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, Avon River, stopbank, green portaloo, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, blue water pipe, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. City Care van by Avon River, stopbank, red zone, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Liquefactioned, red zone house, Avonside Dr / Niven St, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, Avon River, stopbank, blue truck, Avonside Dr / Niven St, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, quake tilted, power pole & Avon River stopbank, Avonside Rd / Breezes Rd, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone housing, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
Across Avon River by Locksley Ave, I saw a red zone, fire destroyed house (which I'd trekked past months before) & several boarded windows on red zone, ghost houses. When would CERA demolish Locksley Ave & Avonside Dr ghost houses?
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone housing, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
25.01.12. Red zone, Avonside Dr view, Christs College Rowing demolition site & Arawa Canoe Club, Kerrs Reach, Avon River, post 23.12 11 quake swarm. Christs College Rowing would be rebuilt
25.01.12. Quake damaged, red zone house, Avonside Dr, nr Porritt Park, post 23.12.11 quake swarm
*Trekked Avondale Rd, Avonside Dr, Edna St, Niven St, Breezes Rd. 195 snaps.
Avonside Dr: Vehicles bumped along: Cars, SUVS, trucks, tanker spraying water laying dust, sucker truck, City Care van. The latter a misnomer, considering greedy comments & contempt for ratepayers, by town clerk Marryatt, about his recent Council approved $68 000 pay rise, giving him $540 000 annual salary. Marryatt earned more than NZ PM, UK PM, USA President! Mayor Parker & sycophant councillors Button, Wells, Keown, Corbett, Reid, Gough had approved Marryatt's astronomical salary.
Marryatt, town clerk since 2007, oversaw Christchurch infrastructure repairs, 17 months post 04.09.10 Darfield Quake. Marryatt's performance so far:
Dodgy sewage system, especially eastern suburbs. Sewage polluted Christchurch rivers.
Dodgy water supply, especially eastern suburbs.
Dodgy electricity supply, eastern suburbs.
Badly repaired roads, pavements, bridges, drains throughout Christchurch.
Opening of Council bldgs for many months post 22.02.11 Killer Quake, like Fendalton & Bishopdale libraries, then closing for safety reasons.
Dodgy quake insurance of Council assets, like AMI Stadium & Town Hall.
During 17 months quake period so far, no matter how many good workers Marryatt managed, many quake victims in Christchurch endured slummy, muddy, dusty conditions, shopped in dangerous places, drove dangerous roads, paid rates for curtailed services, like closed libraries, closed swimming pools, crap infrastructure, including water tankers, pavement portaloos, sewage tanks.
To date, Marryatt hadn't appeared at the Royal Commission of Inquiry, explaining why Council employees / contractors messed pre-quakes bldgs' safety, some which collapsed in the 22.02.11 Killer Quake. (Engineer inspections of bldgs were variable, post Sept 4 Darfield Quake & Boxing Day Quake: confused red, green, yellow, bldg access stickering). Council under Marryatt's quake watch had 5 months post 04.09.10 Darfield Quake (including Boxing Day Quake warning) to sort out engineering inspections & red, yellow, green stickers for bldgs. And cordon dangerous bldgs. Too many dangerous bldgs were used, not forbidden, not cordoned properly during Marryatt's quake watch.
Eleven months post 22.02.11 Killer Quake, Christchurch CBD was still cordon-closed. As CERA boss Sutton earned a salary similar to Marryatt's, why were those two bosses of CERA & Council not working together to demolish damaged bldgs, day & night, to start rebuilding quicker?
As many red zoners, orange zoners, green zoners in eastern suburbs still lived in Third World squalor, in broken houses, with muddy, dusty, poorly repaired streets, bad sewage connections, poor water supply, why were Marryatt's City Care workers & contractors not working day & night to get suburban infrastructure right, asap? Why did Marryatt deserve $540 000 p.a. salary?
Fri 27.01.12. TV news announced that NZ National govt appointed Crown Observer, Kerry Marshall, would keep watch on Christchurch dysfuntional Council. Priority for 2012: Christchurch post quake rebuild. Not internecine squabbles between councillors & town clerk Marryatt.
After a closed Council meeting with MPs Smith & Brownlee, it was announced that town clerk Marryatt had rejected his $68 000 pay rise, approved by mayor Parker & 6 councillors, with the proviso by Maryatt that he'd reject the pay rise only if councillors worked together! Never mind $34 000 increase he'd already been paid. (Ten months later, by mid November Marryatt still hadn't repaid the pay increase, he'd promised to pay back, despite improvement in councillors / Marryatt so-called "colleague" relations).
Marryatt & Parker wanted to gag councillors, stopping them leaking Marryatt's & Parker's doings to the media. That evolved after Marryatt had already accepted the pay rise, causing widespread ratepayers' criticism & a citizens' protest held at Council bldg, Hereford St, midday, 01.02.12.
Fri 27.01.12. 8.42pm, M4.6 quake, 11km depth, 30km west of Christchurch (GeoNet). Disturbed our supper.
Weekend Press Feb 4-5, 2012, would report on red zone, Avonside Dr & limbo existence of Retreat Rd, orange zoners living opp red zoners on the same street. Red zoners could negotiate with CERA / NZ National govt & / or insurers about payouts, while orange zoners awaited slow CERA decisions to red zone or green zone their properties. Why did CERA / NZ National govt only use one slow, geotech company, Tonkin & Taylor, to do land zonings?
During quakes, 2012 would be a year of public protests against top-down edicts by Council & NZ National govt.
Content & pics Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.
See Marryatt may refuse $68 000 rise (The Press / Stuff Co).
See Marryatt may keep $34 000 (The Press / Stuff Co).
See Council warned as Marryatt rejects pay rise (The Press / Stuff Co).
See Anger in a city dispossessed (The Press / Stuff Co).
See Adrift in limbo land (Stuff Co / The Press).
