Posts tagged earthquakes
Aerial Photos of Christchurch
We started flying over Christchurch in October 2011, and we could see straight away that it would be a great way to record the changes in the city, particularly the changes to residential housing. Both the loss of houses in the Residential Red Zone (RRZ) around the river and in the Port Hills, Lyttelton and Kaiapoi and also the new housing areas being built in surrounding areas: Prestons, Kaiapoi, Rangiora, West Melton, Rolleston, Lincoln, Prebleton, Halswell & Wigram Skies.
From the start, the main aim of the photo sequence was to accumulate a long term research repository of photos beginning in September 2010. Ideally the sequence will continue until the rebuild of the city is substantially complete. It was always expected that this would take years which became more like decades as the earthquakes continued, so it would be a long term project.
During the two years of feverish demolition activity to remove most of the dangerous & severely damaged building & make the city safe we spent about four days a month taking photos in the CBD & RRZ. When that phase was substantially completed, we reduced the frequency of the photo shoot to 2 weeks once every six months, as rebuild is much slower than demolition.
Over the years we have undertaken 10 aerial photo shoots. The early shoots were paid for by the National Library as part of the initial commission that Ross held to photograph the impact of the earthquakes. Three of these have been generously sponsored by private donations, including followers of our Facebook page CHCH EQ Photos. We have paid for the majority of the shoots ourselves, out of our commitment to this long term project.
The following photo is a before & after view of the Dallington RRZ where the two photos were taken 3 years apart, one from the first aerial shoot & one from October 2014. This clearly shows the effect of the severe shaking & liquefaction on areas close to the Avon River. Many areas in the lower reaches of the river were similarly affected.
Return to the Central City Red zone
Today, we were back in the red zone after our trip to Vietnam, where Moira was teaching a librarianship course at the Hanoi University of Culture. Spending a few weeks in a completely different environment has given us a fresh perspective on the central city. How long ago it seems that CERA was telling us that they hoped to open up the cordon entirely by April 2012. The centre of the city is still an active demolition zone with the sound of heavy machinery all around.
It seems that the number of buildings still to be demolished stays about the same number, as new buildings are added to the demolition list, as fast as others are demolished. With so much gone, the centre of the city is becoming see through, with surprising vistas right across the city, where there never used to be a line of sight.
While in Italy on other business, we took the opportunity to visit L’Aquila which also suffered a devastating earthquake, similar to Christchurch. We were interested to see how the recovery from the L'Aquila earthquake is similar to Christchurch and where it is different. The 6.3 earthquake occurred on the 6th April 2009 at 3.36am on a Sunday morning. 308 people died, about 10,000 buildings in the city and surrounding villages were damaged and 65,000 people made homeless. The cost of restoration is estimated at €20-30 billion, which is similar to the $20-30 billion estimated for restoration in Christchurch. L'Aquila endured through thousands of foreshocks in the preceding three months and many aftershocks.
The city was founded in 1254, so 80% of the buildings in the centre of the city have historic protection orders. This factor and the differences in funding (L’Aquila has very little insurance money to help with the rebuild) have meant that a different approach has been taken to recovery, with buildings shored up with scaffolding and bracing, while decisions are made about whether to restore them or demolish them. Outside of the historic centre, apartment buildings have been demolished and replaced.
The way the people responded to the earthquake has similarities to Christchurch, especially in the way that the places where people died are honoured. They also have urban knitting as an symbolic expression of how much the people want their city back.
You can view more pictures of L'Aquila