EARTHQUAKE RISKS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 56, 7 March 1934, Page 6

EARTHQUAKE RISKS.

Descriptions both of the general type and the detailed parts of buildings which suffered most in Tuesday's night's earthquake furnish fresh proof of the need in the Dominion for building regulations which aim at minimising earthquake risks. In the towns affected most of the buildings damaged were of an older design, never intended to withstand earthquake shock, while of the methods used in their decoration, little more need be said than that too frequently it was a parapet which crashed to the street below-. These parapets, and other excrescences, useless, ugly, and Ave now know, dangerous, are a distressingly common feature of New Zealanel architectuie. Framed as they would be for a country the different parts of 'which are not equally subject to ear ; .h tremors, the regulations would not need to be inflexible in all respects. The stringency of their application would be in proportion to the degree of risk from earthquake in a given area. But essentially they must embody the same basic protective principles. It is a significant fact that but trivial damage was done in Napier and Hastings. They have learned their j lesson. Three sessions ago a Bill prepared j with the object of modernising buildings 1 against earthquake risk was shelved; and ; nothing has been done since. Before adequate steps are taken, must other towns in the Dominion learn by the tragic experience of Napier and Hastings?