Then came February 22. Although smaller in magnitude (6.3), the peak ground accelerations were vicious.
At the epicentre, the ground acceleration was like the whole city hitting a wall at 22km/h – more than once...
One hundred and eighty one people were killed.
But it wasn’t over. The cruel double shockers of June 13 produced acceleration spikes almost as strong as the killer February quake. And the quakes still haven’t stopped.
To see a central business district fenced off and still in rubble months after the first quake is a strange and solemn thing. The tall buildings have stopped being places of work and become shrines to a lost heart.
And while Cantabrians themselves have not lost heart, they are having to accept that many things about their special, important city have changed significantly. Some of those things are difficult to define; others are of a more practical, prosaic nature – such as traffic patterns.
Road maps coded red for traffic growth and blue for reduction show the circulation of people and goods in Christchurch has visibly shifted east and south. It’s like a huge coronary bypass around the centre, linking the airport, State Highway One and the port in Lyttleton.
Now, as discussions shift toward reconstruction, what, how and where become the big questions authorities like Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority and the Christchurch City Council are beginning to grapple with.
And so, we asked every Christchurch Member we have an email address for their priorities on the future of the city’s transport. From 29,000 Members, we got 5,000 replies within the two-week survey period. The result is a bit like a very large, well-structured meeting at a town hall. Only those interested show up, but they have firm views and every one counts.
The survey captured people who had left the city because of the earthquakes (149) and, almost a year after the first quake, people who were living in what they considered to be temporary accommodation (417). Most had no intention of leaving town. The effect of family remaining in Christchurch was a significant influence on the decision to stay.
We asked respondents how the earthquakes had affected their transport use. Some 31% had experienced workplace disruption, 33% had changed supermarkets, 16% had changed schools. Not surprisingly, the biggest change in transport mode for the most common trips has been work trips using the bus, which fell 60% to four percent of respondents. This is probably because so many Christchurch bus routes ran through the now closed central business district.
When it came to how respondents lived their lives, it was pretty clear that the car was king, both before and after the quakes...
So, the very surprising thing was the strong support for rail-based reconstruction solutions, given that, to be viable, rail depends on moving large numbers of people along a line (or in a circle) and it doesn’t respond well to natural disasters.
If passenger trains were returned to the existing corridor, 14% of respondents (who visit the CBD at least once a week) say they would use it. If a rail spur was added in the central city, that would increase to 21%. Half of these users would be commuters, the rest would use it for other purposes. This plan is buildable. Asked more generally about planning for future suburbs, respondents put a high priority on cycleways (82%), off-road light rail services (59%), bus lanes (56%), on-road light rail (36%), and heavy rail (22%). This was regardless of age, gender or occupational status.
Asked about options for a new central city, there was strong support for the retention of the one-way system (56% support,17% opposition), the majority supported a 30km/h speed limit in the central city (47% support, 27% opposition), and a three-hour maximum on parking in the city centre (40% support vs 21% opposition). More contentious was eliminating on-street parking along arterial routes (45% for vs 36% against). Given that these people were selected because they belong to the AA shows that car owners are far from partisan when thinking about transport futures.
Even so, there is a bit of a gap between the vision of a city with extensive public transport and the city as it is now, with many wrecked roads and bridges, a no-go CBD and a growing congestion problem, as commerce shifts to adapt to new realities. With EQC’s cupboard already bare and another $12 billion in costs, mostly due to land loss, finding money for expensive new PT systems seems optimistic.
Much of this is about stress reduction. Like those in wartime, Christchurch people are seriously stressed by all the uncertainty. Travel-related stress (which was growing before the quakes) is just one stress too many. Perhaps the worst source of stress is the lack of certainty by democratic leaders about what should be done. By relaying what our Members want, we are doing our best to help the city’s leaders do what all our Christchurch Members want most. Decide, and get on with it.
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7 November 2011 | By pking
5 November 2011 | By glenkoorey
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