Another Christchurch building was closed yesterday, yes, two years after the first of our earthquakes. South Library, the only library to be open pretty much all through the months following the disaster, closed yesterday after a detailed building survey. It's not that the building is structurally damaged or a huge risk to people in there, but the land underneath the building is slumping. To what degree the land has slumped or whether it's continuing or how fast it's going is still to be found out. The building fronts onto a river, so presumably the land is pretty soft and wet. This is going to be a big loss to the south Christchurch community, as our other large library, Linwood, is indefinitely closed, I think to be rebuilt eventually. It's also a big blow to the staff, who will now have to be located in other libraries, often far away from their homes, in different teams with different colleagues.
News also that our Art Gallery, a brand new building that was Civil Defence headquarters for many months, will have to be lifted and placed on rubber foundations. This is going to cost a whopping $36 million dollars! Of course, there are questions. Why were the foundations not earthquake proof in the first place? Answer: it would have cost too much and the chances of having an earthquake in Christchurch were regarded as slim. So we gambled on this probability and lost.
This is something that we didn't think of, that the earthquakes were a disaster that would have long-term effects. Yes, we got used to the physical aftershocks (well, sort of), but the ongoing knock-on effects in every sphere of life that you can think of were not something that we considered. It's very disheartening, even for those whose homes and liveliehoods were not destroyed. The city falls down, you build it again, right? But if the land underneath has changed, and is now a jellyish sponge, what can you rebuild? Ho hum. Two steps forward, one step back.
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