### ODT Online Sat, 8 Oct 2011
Heritage building workshop planned
By David Loughrey
Communication between Dunedin building owners and the city council is strengthening, as the council works to help owners find ways to re-use the city’s stock of heritage buildings.
The council’s second annual one-day workshop for heritage building owners will be held on November 23. The theme this year is “After Christchurch: What to know about owning an older building”, with the free workshop targeting owners of non-residential buildings.
The first workshop, an initiative of the council’s heritage buildings economic re-use steering group, attracted more than 80 people last November, with numbers bolstered by concerns following the first major Christchurch earthquake. Council heritage policy planner Glen Hazelton said strong interest was expected again.
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7.10.11 DCC Media Release
To register or for more information contact Glen Hazelton 477 4000 or ghazelto@dcc.govt.nz
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Workshop Highlights
• Speakers include Jason Ingham, from the University of Auckland and co-author of a report for the Canterbury Earthquakes Royal Commission entitled ‘The Performance of Unreinforced Masonry Buildings (URM) in the 2010/2011 Canterbury Earthquake Swarm’, Alan Race (Crombie Lockwood) on insurance matters, and Lou Robinson (Hadley Robinson) on earthquake strengthening.
• The New Zealand Historic Places Trust and Dunedin City Council will provide presentations, with the DCC outlining its new Earthquake-prone Buildings Policy and the range of incentives available to heritage building owners to assist earthquake strengthening.
• Steve Macknight of Steve Macknight Strengthening and Design and Lawrie Forbes of Zeal Steel, will conduct site visits to earthquake strengthening projects.
Workshop for Heritage Building Owners Information Flyer (PDF, 219.6 KB)
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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr
What if? Dunedin... 
### ODT Online Tue, 11 Oct 2011
Historic home taken off the market
By Hamish McNeilly
The owners of a $1 million Dunedin historic home have taken the property off the market as they struggle to find earthquake cover. The British-owned Ansvar Insurance – the largest insurer of churches and heritage buildings in New Zealand – announced late last month it would no longer provide earthquake coverage.
• NZ Historic Places Trust national heritage policy manager Nicola Jackson said the trust was working with heritage owners to find a solution regarding earthquake cover. The trust’s advice was for heritage owners to investigate all options with insurance companies. It helped to have up-to-date information for potential insurers such as the construction details and history of their property and how it had been maintained and improved.
• An Insurance Council spokesman said he was confident the market would cover historic properties.
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### ODT Online Wed, 12 Oct 2011
Urgent call to strengthen buildings
By Adam Bennett – New Zealand Herald
The Royal Commission investigating building failures during the Christchurch quakes has urgently recommended immediate steps to strengthen about 3500 unreinforced masonry buildings throughout New Zealand. The commission’s interim report released this morning ahead of public hearings which begin next week contains a series of recommendations “which reflect our view that urgent action is required in respect of some aspects of current building design practice, both in Christchurch and elsewhere, to make some buildings’ elements (particularly stairs and floors in multi-storey buildings) more resilient”, commission chairman Justice Mark Cooper said. APNZ
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### idealog.co.nz 17 October 2011 at 9:44 am
National policy needed to quake proof buildings
By Esther Goh
Property Council chief executive Connal Townsend’s comments follow the release of a report prepared for the Royal Commission that proposes a single national policy for unreinforced masonry building (URM) maintenance and seismic strengthening. ‘The Performance of Unreinforced Masonry Buildings in the 2010/2011 Canterbury Earthquake Swarm’, a technical paper co-authored by Associate Professor Jason Ingham and Professor Michael Griffith…said all URM buildings should be improved to the full design strength required for new buildings in New Zealand, so that the public would be protected from falling hazards such as chimneys, parapets, gable end walls and out-of-plane wall failures.
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See comment above for Interim Report.
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Here is the Addendum Report (October 2011) to the Royal Commission of Inquiry on the performance of earthquake strengthened URM buildings in the Christchurch CBD in the 22 February 2011 earthquake, by Assoc Prof Jason M Ingham, University of Auckland, and Prof Michael C Griffith, University of Adelaide.
Ingham Addendum Report (PDF, 3.58 MB)
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Related Posts:
13.9.11 DCC assistance possible for earthquake strengthening
14.4.11 Public consultation for DCC Earthquake-prone Buildings Policy
28.3.11 Dunedin earthquake proneness 2
9.3.11 Dunedin earthquake proneness
### ODT Online Fri, 25 Nov 2011
Bid to reinforce buildings
By Chris Morris
Owners of Dunedin buildings have been urged to begin strengthening these against damage from potential earthquakes as soon as possible. The request was backed by a promise of more support from the Dunedin City Council. The message was delivered to about 120 people, many of them owners of commercial buildings, at a council workshop in Dunedin this week.
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### ODT Online Fri, 25 Nov 2011
Strengthening starts
By Matthew Haggart
Residential halls and colleges at the University of Otago are scheduled to be among the first buildings to undergo a round of earthquake strengthening. University chief operating officer John Patrick told an audience at a recent public lecture remedial work to strengthen Cumberland College was scheduled to be carried out before students returned for the 2012 year.
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### ODT Online Thu, 1 Dec 2011
Court buildings closed for strengthening
By Debbie Porteous
The Oamaru and Balclutha courthouses will be closed, possibly for the next year, while remedial earthquake strengthening work is carried out, and the Dunedin courthouse is being assessed to see if it needs work.
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### ODT Online Fri, 2 Dec 2011
Confident an insurer will be found
By Matthew Haggart
Insurance cover for Dunedin’s historic Presbyterian churches is set to expire this month, after their main insurance provider has quit the New Zealand market because of earthquake losses. Ansvar Insurance will leave because of the prohibitive cost of gaining affordable reinsurance protection for itself, following on from the Christchurch earthquakes – a move which could affect several of Dunedin’s places of worship.
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### ODT Online Fri, 2 Dec 2011
Editorial: Justice close to home
Perhaps the authorities are being prudent in closing the Oamaru and Balclutha courthouses for remedial earthquake strengthening work. Caution in the wake of the Christchurch earthquakes is understandable, and those in charge of public buildings need to be highly aware of their responsibilities. They will also want to cover themselves just in case something did happen. Perhaps, though, with questions beginning to be raised about engineering and policy and earthquake risk, they are going too far.
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Other ODT stories:
Worries town will lose court, services
Alternative sitting venue sought
### ODT Online Sun, 11 Dec 2011
No approach on court alternative
By Eileen Goodwin
The Dunedin City Council has not been approached about Carisbrook being used as an alternative court venue in the event of the Dunedin courthouse failing its seismic assessment, city property manager Robert Clark says. While the Dunedin courthouse seismic assessment is awaited, rumours have surfaced that Carisbrook is being considered as an alternative venue.
Read more
### ODT Online Thu, 22 Dec 2011
Quake-work closure puts pressure on courts
By Debbie Porteous
Pressure on the South’s already stretched courts increased yesterday when Dunedin’s two jury trial courtrooms and most of the original part of the city’s courthouse were closed for up to a year for earthquake-strengthening work. The Ministry of Justice announced a structural assessment of the 110-year-old building found its tower was at risk of collapsing in a significant earthquake.
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### ODT Online Wed, 21 Dec 2011
Dunedin courtrooms to close for quake work
By Online ODT
Two of the five courtrooms at Dunedin’s courthouse will be closed for up to a year following an assessment that found they needed to be strengthened in case of earthquakes. The Ministry of Justice announced this afternoon the court’s Tower Block had been identified as posing a risk in a significant seismic event.
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### ODT Online Sat, 24 Dec 2011
Not a tower of strength
By Debbie Porteous
The tower on the historic Dunedin courthouse was strengthened in 1993 – except for the ground floor level supporting it. An engineers’ report on the building released yesterday revealed the tower’s strength was only 15% to 20% of building code, prompting the Ministry of Justice decision this week to partially close the courthouse until the tower’s seismic capacity can be increased.
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### ODT Online Sat, 3 Dec 2011
Catholic churches face premium rise
By Matthew Haggart
Dunedin’s historic Catholic churches are next in line to face forecast rises in insurance premiums, which has been likened to a “tsunami about to hit”. Dunedin Catholic Diocese general manager Stuart Young said church parishioners were ultimately the ones who would bear the costs of rising insurance premiums, brought about by the Christchurch earthquakes.
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A little bird tells me that the Bing Harris building is short of a few tenants. Masterful restoration and all, still short of earthquake strengthening…
The above blog is simply untrue… The Bing Harris is not short of Tenants, and it has been strengthened to a level above 67% of New Building Standard.
One tenant is leaving as they were affected by the earthquake in Christchurch and now have a fear of unreinforced Masonry buildings.
The truth from Christchurch is that it is likely that no-one was killed by strengthened unreinforced masonry buildings, and in fact almost no-one was killed inside unstrengthened buildings….around 40 were killed on the street and the remainder in the newer concrete buildings.
The way to make Dunedin safe is to encourage tenants to use strengthened buildings thereby creating a demand for these spaces and giving landlords the opportunity to carry out this work.
Earthquake strengthening does work. It is the comments and attitudes above that we should fear as this will stop it happening.
Thanks for prompt reply, Steve.
“There was no response yesterday to a request asking why the ground floor of the tower was not strengthened in 1993.” I don’t expect there would have been a response, had the question been asked “Who was responsible for planning and for OKing the previous half-assed work” because that’s one of the nice things about working for rates- and tax-payer funded organisations. Nobody never has to own up and it’s just not cricket, old chap, for them to be shown up. Thus incompetents progress from botch to botch and bonus to bonus.
Chartered engineers have to sign off on their work…
As the then chair of NZHPT Otago Branch, I was toured the courthouse at various times during construction and redevelopment. The visits included scrutiny of building plans and specifications, conservation measures, staged work and finishing treatments – with NZHPT advisory and conservation staff, Opus Architecture, court officials, a Minister of the Crown, et al – plus inspection of completed strengthening work inside the tower, with the expert chartered engineer. I doubt there is anything sinister in latest news. Department of Courts had a constrained budget for the redevelopment at the time. As for most large buildings, strengthening usually occurs in stages – and Christchurch hadn’t yet befallen ‘New Zealand’.
The University of Otago Registry clock tower is also due strengthening work. As we know, the Municipal Chambers has only recently received more steel.
The building code and DCC’s earthquake-prone building policy have all stepped up by requirement.
So it’s not unknown, it’s just kept “within the family” right?