Year 3 CERA. Behind the Wire: NW Suburban Repairs, Rebuilds. Copthorne Hotel Collapse

Behind The Wire: NW Suburbs, Copthorne Hotel Collapse focus. Fri 27.09.13. Ever since 4 September quake, Cantabrians were behind the wire.

4 September quake: Steel mesh fence cordons evolved around damaged & dangerous bldgs. Council's rapid assessments of bldgs wasn't organized properly, so many dangerous bldgs which should've been behind the wire weren't. I saw Council green and yellow stickers on the same bldg in St Asaph St. Saw several assessment sticker confusions like that.

26 December quake: More steel mesh fence cordons, more Council rapid assessments, more cockups for damaged, dangerous bldgs. Saw Cashel Mall steel mesh fence cordoned at The Crossing & The Press bldg, Cathedral Sq, red stickered. But in 22 February quake, workers were inside The Press bldg: one killed, others injured.

22 February quake: 185 dead, 6 600+ injured. Instead of red stickering, Council twice green stickered shaky CTV post 4 September quake & 26 December quake. More steel mesh fence cordons around properties. CBD was steel mesh fence cordoned, red zoned for 28 months by Civil Defence, then CERA, citizens banned. Only people allowed behind the wire: CERA approved contractors, CERA officials, cops, NZDF soldiers.

13 June quake & 23 December quake swarm: More steel mesh fence cordons for damaged, dangerous bldgs. 

CERA red zoned 8060 residential properties along riversides & on the Port Hills. All ended up behind the wire after evacuations, CERA / NZ National govt takings & demolitions. While red zoners negotiated CERA offers, they were behind the wire, formed by NZ National govt / CERA red zoning.

Some people were still behind the wire, while NZ National govt / CERA dithered over red zoning reviews. CERA minister Brownlee often apologized for CERA delays, jabbering about getting things right, despite CERA delays!

EQC & insurers followed Brownlee's delay tactics, putting property owners behind more wire.

Likewise 28 000 TC3 green zoners were behind the wire: compelled to strengthen house foundations on damaged land.

While 1 000s of demolitions took place in the CBD & in residential red zones, all those properties were behind the wire. After CBD demolitions, there was rubble, dust, weeds, Wilson carparks in the CBD, behind the wire. In residential red zones, once CERA demolitions finished, overgrown properties had shrubs & trees left. CERA then put residential red zone properties behind the wire again: CERA no access signs hung on wire fences.

Three years post 4 September quake, that wasn't the end of the wire: repairs, rebuilds in the suburbs, demolition sites, construction sites behind the wire.

SCIRT workers were behind the wire, steel mesh fence cordons, orange, plastic, road cones, while excavating, repairing roads.

Depending on viewpoint, insider or outsider, we were all behind the wire in quaking Christchurch.

Friday 27.09.13. On her drives to London St work, Leah dropped me off by N Hagley Park. I tekked back home to Burnside, 6km odd. I avoided noisy main roads, like Memorial Ave, Wairakei Rd, Papanui Rd, trekking back to Burnside via quiet roads in Fendalton, Merivale, Bryndwyr. I crossed busy roads like Holmwood Rd, Glandovey Rd, Idris Rd, but left them asap. 

NW suburbs, behind the wire: Some damages, invisible, as some houses hid behind high garden walls & wooden fences. Damages, evidenced by contractors' vehicles parked by fencing: concreters, asphalters, roofers, cladders, electricians, plumbers, plasterers, painters, tree trimmers, scaffolders, builders, landscape designers...

Contractors, architects, builders, insurers hung ad boards on the wire. Election boards hung on fences, grinning faces. Real estate boards touted damaged housing for sale: "TC2... Geotech & LIM reports available... As is where is basis... No insurance... Repair or Rebuild option... Auction..." God help Council when it calculated new rates for CERA's green zoning: TC1, TC2, TC3. What a mess. Town clerk Marryatt resigned just in time for another CEO to be blamed for new rates.

As so many houses still needed repairs & rebuilds, it was an indictment of slow EQC, slow insurers. Complainers in other suburbs were justified in their complaints about EQC & insurers. (During & after 2016, thousands of shoddy EQC repairs, overseen by Fletcher, would need to be redone).

NW suburbs I trekked: strange mix of mostly inhabited houses, some behind the wire, some ghosts, some demolition sites, some construction sites, many repair sites, more homes still without repairs, evidenced by boarded walls, chimney gaps, windows. Some house walls & garden walls were wood-braced, grey weathering showing how long it took EQC to settle under cap $15 000 - $100 000 repairs & insurers to settle over cap $100 000 repairs.

For small repairs below $15 000, home owners were cash paid by EQC. Our Heath St, 3 bedroom rental had minor cracks, garage doors no longer locking, but we still awaited repairs. Our slumlord pocketed EQC cash, leaving the house unfixed. We had lots of experience seeing slumlords doing few repairs, as pre & post quakes, 9 years so far, Jake had tenanted many rentals, incl a garage with chemical toilet for 6 months post 22 February quake. During our 18 years' Christchurch residence, slumlords we knew did few repairs & less maintenance on their rentals. 

Home owners had the choice to take EQC / insurer money & run, or use it for repairs. Undercap repairs were overseen by Fletcher, CERA's stooge, or homeowners could opt out of Fletcher repairs & contract their own repairs, hence all the different contractors. Not a Fletcher board in sight, as Fletcher sub-contracted shoddy repairs. Non repaired houses would cause anomalies in future Rates Valuations & hassles for future home buyers in suburbs.

Nothing stopped vendors pocketing EQC / insurance payouts, not fixing their housing, vending as is, where is. If buyers, real estate agents, conveyancing lawyers were asleep, regarding post house repairs, there would be hell to pay for future house buyers. Buying a pre-quakes house in Christchurch would be chancy. Despite post-quakes, repairs / rebuilds hassles, there were several real estate boards touting houses or land for sale en route. 

My notes gave an idea of many contractors doing post-quakes, residential repairs & constructions in NW suburbs. Ramping up at last, residential repairs & constructions, 3 years post 4 September quake:

Helmores Ln off N Hagley Park: Helmores Ln Bridge, wood span bridge over Avon River, steel mesh fence cordoned, white / orange, plastic bollarded. Wood spans OK, but spans were ripped away from concrete abutments sunk in Avon River mud. I saw that abutment / span-join damage all over Christchurch. Piers & spans withstood quakes OK, but abutments sank into mud, or tilted at odd angles from spans, causing damage to spans. Some spans rotated horizontally in quakes, causing concrete spalling off abutments.

Helmores Ln Bridge: Repaired by SCIRT, 2016.

Helmores Ln: Demolition site. GREGG builder board on hedge. MEADOW landscape board, Architect board, Structural engineer board. Surveyor board on a steel mesh fence cordon by a  construction site. Parked CONCUT van.

Holmwood Rd: Broken brick wall behind a steel mesh fence. Boarded window on 2 storey house. HARCOURTS For Sale board on fence by a construction site. Yellow digger, SCIRT excavation behind a steel mesh fence cordon & detour by Holmwood Rd / Memorial Ave junction.

Garden Rd: Patched house wall. Wood braced, garden, brick wall, blue tarp on garage door. Boarded wall on brick house. Ghost house, overgrown garden.

Broken brick wall, locked gate by demolition site. Boarded window, 2 storey house. DUNCAN TAYLOR builders board on fence, Duncan Taylor van & orange digger on demolition site, steel mesh fence cordoned. STONEWOOD safety board on wooden fence. BUCHAN HOMES builder board on garden, stone wall.

AVON DICKIE construction board on garden, brick wall. White dump truck in driveway. Ghost house behind locked picket gate.

House: boarded windows, roof patch caused by broken chimney, behind wisteria festooned garden, wooden fence. NEW ZEALAND POST notice on footpath letter box informed residents of closure of postal facilities, like road letter boxes. Sackings not mentioned.

NZ Post notice:

                 Please be aware this posting receptacle will be removed
                              between 7 October and 11 October 2013.

                    Mail will be cleared as usual until the box is removed.

                The nearest posting box is 60 Holmwood Road with a final
                                              posting time of 2 pm.

New Zealand Post is optimising the network of posting facilities to ensure a fair
balance between community needs, customer usage and servicing / security
                                                         costs...

Quake survivor, wooden, road bridge over Wairarapa Stream, concrete abutments OK. Collapsed brick & tile house, Wairarapa Tce off Garden Rd. Three years trekking post 4 September quake, thought I'd seen it all, but still spooked seeing collapsed housing for the first time. HARCOURTS Auction board: uninsured, 2 storey, wooden house. Another 2 storey, wooden ghost, unrepaired top storey cnr.

IAG insurer board on steel gate. Part demolished, 2 storey house by construction site, concrete foundations laid, steel mesh fence cordoned. SUGRUE construction board on cordon fence.
 

BAYLEYS Auction board, house SOLD.
   

Poynder Ave: BEHIND THE WIRE board on steel mesh fence cordon near a shipping container on a construction site. More boards on cordon fence: Hazard board, VERO insurer, JOHN CREIGHTON builder.

LANDSCAPES design / construction board on wooden fence by scaffolded, 2 storey house. Big construction site, TAKAHE construction board on fence. CSL shipping container parked on road.
  

Wroxton Tce: Wood braced, garden, brick wall. Election poster on wooden fence. Parked LASER PLUMBING van.

Black plastic covered bay window, 2 storey house. Faded boards covered fallen chimney hole, another 2 storey house. Like those houses & others awaiting repairs, friends of Leah's still awaited EQC's & insurer's decisions whether their house near Wroxton Tce would be repaired, or demolished for a rebuild. Three years post 4 September quake, huge stress caused by slow insurers!

Parked van, A TEAM plasterers: When I took a pic, plasterer gave me a thumbs-up, making big bucks from repairs. Demolished garden wall, steel & orange, plastic, fence cordoned.

Wroxton Tce / Idris Rd junction: Election posters on boarded fence. Election poster on wooden fence, Wroxton Tce cnr.

 

Idris Rd: Yellow digger made a heap of roof metal for salvage on a house demolition site. Red salvage truck reversing into the driveway caused a traffic jam. Road users were familiar with trucks causing traffic jams all over Christchurch. Wood-braced electrical substation.

Glandovey Rd: Scaffolded garage. Election poster on wooden fence. WARNER fences van reversed into a driveway. Painter's van parked in another driveway.

2 storey house, boarded windows. Brick gate post, strapped to a wooden fence, stopping collapse. Since quakes, nylon straps secured loose bits of buildings all over town. EQC, Fletcher, insurers took too long sorting out simple repairs like a dangerous gate post by a busy road.

 

Orange, plastic, road cone cordon surrounding yellow sewage pump, obstructed traffic in the middle of the road. Traffic would be obstructed by road works for years to come. SCIRT was only now ramping up CBD road works.

Glandovey Rd / Garreg Rd: Town house construction, steel mesh cordoned. Several boards on the wire: INTEGRA masonry, Hazard, DULUX paint, LIGHTING PLUS.

Garreg Rd: Demolition site: HARCOURTS Sold board, steel mesh fence cordoned. MILES construction board on the wire. CBEER construction board & hazard board on wooden fence. CARTERS builder DANGER board on another wooden fence. TREEWORKS trucks parked on driveway by flowering cherry blossoms. Brick house: wood-braced, end wall. Another house: wood boarded in front.

Ashby Pl: Two large, 2 storey, concrete & brick ghosts, steel mesh fence cordoned. Brickwork cracks, bricks fallen in places. Some windows & walls boarded.

Bryndwyr Rd / Newell Ave: Driveway parked, painter van, painter packing up. Cracks painted over?

*Trekked Helmores Ln, Holmwood Rd, Garden Rd, Poynder Ave, Wroxton Tce, Idris Rd, Glandovey Rd, Garreg Rd, Ashby Pl, Newell Ave, Victoria Sq, Manchester St, Cambridge Tce. 165 images.

Victoria Sq: Sat 28.09.13. OneNews reported 10 storey Copthorne Hotel collapsed during demolition. No one injured while a Southern Demolition digger chomped. Unsafe demolition: 2 wobbly N & S shear walls, disconnected concrete floors collapsing in between. Why did it take so long demolishing? Nearby, Town Hall ghost up Colombo St got a helluva shaking.

Behind a steel mesh fence cordon, Victoria Sq, Queen Victoria statue was amused. Capt James Cook statue stared. He'd seen it all before.

29.09.13. Victoria Sq view, demolition collapsed Copthorne Hotel. Capt James Cook statue foreground left

Like Town Hall ghost, Forsyth Barr / Crowne Plaza Hotel ghost other ghosts & demolished bldgs in the vicinity, Copthorne Hotel ghost was built on swampland near Avon River. Copthorne Hotel was abandoned for over 2 years while ghosts behind it were demolished, including PWC high- rise, so Copthorne Hotel hadn't only endured 13 000 quakes, but endured 1 000s of digger thumpings during nearby demolitions. Steel rebars would've been shaken & shocked by quakes & demolitions. Steel mesh fence cordon, threat signs:

DANGER
KEEP OUT

EXTREME DANGER
KEEP OUT

AUTHORISED
PERSONNEL ONLY

29.09.13. Victoria Sq view, demolition collapsed Copthorne Hotel. Abandoned Ernst & Young left awaited demolition

Sun 29.09.13. From behind the steel mesh fence cordon on Cambridge Tce, Manchester St Bridge, Armagh St & Victoria Sq, I had a good look at demolition collapsed Copthorne Hotel: The NW shear wall had failed & sunk about a foot into the ground.

29.09.13. Cambridge Tce view, Oxford Tce & demolition collapsed Copthorne Hotel. Abandoned Forsyth Barr / Crowne Plaza Hotel left awaited repairs. Abandoned Victoria Square apartments behind awaited demolition for CERA's Blueprint Convention Centre / Te Pae. Abandoned Town Hall right awaited repairs

NW shear-wall on the outside was divided longitudinally by a stairwell in the middle. Easily seen from Cambridge Tce, huge concrete crack on NW shear-wall base, exposing failed rebars, tons of shear-wall concrete sunk into the ground, shear-wall base bulging N. About half way up NW shear-wall, a horizontal shadow-line of a demolished neighbouring roof. Shadow line, about a foot below horizontal shadow roof-line of adjoining NE shear-wall.

After a thump from a Southern Demolition digger, NW shear-wall failed, sinking into the ground, putting huge strain on rebars in shear-walls & rebars in concrete floors connected to shear-walls. Weak rebar connections snapped, thin concrete columns supporting concrete floors snapped. Collapse! N & S shear-walls, left standing, pancaked, collapsed floors horizontal in between. Anything living between those concrete floors before collapse would've been pulverized: Dusty DNA.

At inner cnrs of N & S shear-walls, all floors had rebars hanging, where concrete floors snapped off & collapsed. Two thin, concrete columns still stood in the middle of the mess between shear-walls, sparse rebars hanging.

29.09.13. Manchester St Bridge view, Oxford Tce, demolition collapsed Copthorne Hotel right. Abandoned Forsyth Barr / Crowne Plaza Hotel left awaited repairs. Abandoned Victoria Square apartments middle left awaited demolition for CERA's Blueprint Convention Centre / Te Pae

29.09.13. Cambridge Tce view, Oxford Tce, collapsed Copthorne Hotel. Abandoned Forsyth Barr / Crowne Plaza Hotel left awaited repairs. Victoria Square apartments right awaited demolition for CERA's Blueprint Convention Centre / Te Pae

As Christchurch red zone CBD was behind the wire for 28 months, guarded by cop & NZDF checkpoints, there was no public scrutiny in forbidden CBD. There would be delay while bureaucrats investigated Copthorne Hotel collapse during demolition. Waste of time & money.

That demolition fiasco confirmed why I'd never enter any high-rise in Christchurch CBD again, no matter how "safe." So far, after 13 000 quakes & many demolition thumpings in the CBD, how many shear-walls & other walls had repeatedly bounced, weakening bldgs? Quakes & demolitions weakened rebars. And Council wanted to reintroduce trams into the CBD, further weakening bldgs with their rumblings.

Those who worked behind the wire had a sledge-hammer mentality, still going despite new public scrutiny after cordons dropped. Hammering came from CERA minister Brownlee's red zonings & CBD Blueprint enabling red zone demolition bashings: bash residential red zoners, bash TC3 green zoners, bash CBD property owners in CERA's Blueprint Frame into submission!

London St: Behind the wire, Leah endured months of seismic demolition thumpings at her school, due to intermittent SCIRT excavations & part-demolitions of nearby Richmond Working Mens Club. She'd had enough & wanted to leave the school, after working there full-time for 9 years. (The school would only be repaired in 2015, two years after she'd left).

Papanui Rd: Behind the wire, Jake endured seismic thumpings when Chinese Methodist Church was demolished next door to his Brewers Arms workplace. When I told him about Copthorne Hotel collapse, he laughed. Deja vu: Under The Red Verandah restaurant collapsed beside him in 22 February quake, Worcester St / Tancred St. 

Horatio St: Behind the wire, Douglas Furnishers, Luke endured seismic thumpings while CERES demolition diggers demolished DB Brewery across the road, then crushed salvage-concrete on site. Whenever I fetched Luke from work, I experienced seismic thumpings, causing my parked car to bounce, while CERES diggers crushed concrete. When I mentioned demolition thumpings, Luke stared like I was mad. He'd habituated to thumpings, although his workplace shook several times daily when CERES digger thumped.

Like Douglas Furnishers, many weak bldgs along Antigua St, Horatio St & Balfour Tce were slated for CCDU's Blueprint Metro Sports Facility. So far, like Copthorne Hotel, they were weakened by 13 000 quakes & 1 000s of digger thumpings. Bugger worker safety, business as usual. 

Meanwhile, CERA appealed a court case which ruled red zoning illegal. (Red zones were formed by NZ National govt edict). Unless NZ National govt gazetted Avon River red zone as parkland, controlled by Council or DOC, future NZ govts could feed at Avon River trough, processing red zone land for developers.

Content & pics Copyright Mark JS Esslemont.

See Rates hike to hit homes (The Press / Stuff Co). 

See Work halted after Copthorne collapse (The Press / Stuff Co). 

See $15m to connect Avon River to sea (The Press / Stuff Co).

See Tremors exposed Earthquake Commission (The Press / Stuff Co).