’Quake order on four buildings

Press, 28 February 1986, Page 5

’Quake order on four buildings

' Urgent strengthening work has been ordered on four central Christchurch buildings, two of which house restaurants. The three-storey building at 111 Hereford Street, which has shops and Scandals Restaurant, must be strengthened in spite of a dispute over its ownership, says the Christchurch City Council’s town planning hearings panel. The High Court will decide who actually owns the building, but the panel will serve notice on the owners “on paper” to have the work done. Without the work the building would collapse in a moderate earthquake,

and is not secure enough for a restaurant, according to the council’s buildings engineer, Mr Bryan Bluck.

Two Gloucester Street buildings are reported to need urgent measures to support them because another building between the two has been demolished. The centre building had provided resistance to lateral earthquake shaking.

The Cupid Shop and the Rainbow Restaurant and Takeaways in Gloucester Street have had their load-bearing walls exposed by the removal of the other building.

Even if another building was erected on the

now vacant centre site, it would not come to the walls of adjacent buildings, Mr Bluck said. Supports were needed. The owners of the buildings will be asked to take prompt action to secure them.

Demolition of buildings round the Kate Sheppard Women’s Bookshop in High Street is reported to have made supports necessary for its loadbearing walls. The present brick wall on the north-east is required to be replaced by a new wall and supports to bring it up to by-law standards. At present it is an earthquake danger, says Mr Bluck.