Churches are an important part of New Zealand's historical and architectural heritage. Various earthquakes around the world have highlighted the significant seismic vulnerability of religious buildings, with the extensive damage that occurred to stone and clay-brick unreinforced masonry churches after the 2010-2011 Canterbury earthquakes emphasising the necessity to better understand this structural type. Consequently, a country-wide inventory of unreinforced masonry churches is here identified. After a bibliographic and archival investigation, and a 10 000 km field trip, it is estimated that currently 297 unreinforced masonry churches are present throughout New Zealand, excluding 12 churches demolished in Christchurch because of heavy damage sustained during the Canterbury earthquake sequence. The compiled database includes general information about the buildings, their architectural features and structural characteristics, and any architectural and structural transformations that have occurred in the past. Statistics about the occurrence of each feature are provided and preliminary interpretations of their role on seismic vulnerability are discussed. The list of identified churches is reported in annexes, supporting their identification and providing their address.
Unreinforced masonry churches in New Zealand, similarly to everywhere else in the word have proven to be highly vulnerable to earthquakes, because of their particular construction features. The Canterbury (New Zealand) earthquake sequence, 2010-2011 caused an invaluable loss of local architectural heritage and of churches, as regrettably, some of them were demolished instead of being repaired. It is critical for New Zealand to advance the data collection, research and understanding pertaining to the seismic performance and protection of church buildings, with the aim to:
As part of the 'Project Masonry' Recovery Project funded by the New Zealand Natural Hazards Research Platform, commencing in March 2011, an international team of researchers was deployed to document and interpret the observed earthquake damage to masonry buildings and to churches as a result of the 22nd February 2011 Christchurch earthquake. The study focused on investigating commonly encountered failure patterns and collapse mechanisms. A brief summary of activities undertaken is presented, detailing the observations that were made on the performance of and the deficiencies that contributed to the damage to approximately 650 inspected unreinforced clay brick masonry (URM) buildings, to 90 unreinforced stone masonry buildings, to 342 reinforced concrete masonry (RCM) buildings, to 112 churches in the Canterbury region, and to just under 1100 residential dwellings having external masonry veneer cladding. In addition, details are provided of retrofit techniques that were implemented within relevant Christchurch URM buildings prior to the 22nd February earthquake and brief suggestions are provided regarding appropriate seismic retrofit and remediation techniques for stone masonry buildings. http://www.nzsee.org.nz/publications/nzsee-quarterly-bulletin/
The sequence of earthquakes that has affected Christchurch and Canterbury since September 2010 has caused damage to a great number of buildings of all construction types. Following post-event damage surveys performed between April 2011 and June 2011, an inventory of the stone masonry buildings in Christchurch and surrounding areas was carried out in order to assemble a database containing the characteristic features of the building stock, as a basis for studying the vulnerability factors that might have influenced the seismic performance of the stone masonry building stock during the Canterbury earthquake sequence. The damage suffered by unreinforced stone masonry buildings is reported and different types of observed failures are described using a specific survey procedure currently in use in Italy. The observed performance of seismic retrofit interventions applied to stone masonry buildings is also described, as an understanding of the seismic response of these interventions is of fundamental importance for assessing the utility of such strengthening techniques when applied to unreinforced stone masonry structures. AM - Accepted Manuscript
Following the magnitude 6.3 aftershock in Christchurch, New Zealand, on 22 February 2011, a number of researchers were sent to Christchurch as part of the New Zealand Natural Hazard Research Platform funded “Project Masonry” Recovery Project. Their goal was to document and interpret the damage to the masonry buildings and churches in the region. Approximately 650 unreinforced and retrofitted clay brick masonry buildings in the Christchurch area were surveyed for commonly occurring failure patterns and collapse mechanisms. The entire building stock of Christchurch, and in particular the unreinforced masonry building stock, is similar to that in the rest of New Zealand, Australia, and abroad, so the observations made here are relevant for the entire world.
Following the Christchurch earthquake of 22 February 2011 a number of researchers were sent to Christchurch, New Zealand to document the damage to masonry buildings as part of “Project Masonry”. Coordinated by the Universities of Auckland and Adelaide, researchers came from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Italy, Portugal and the US. The types of masonry investigated were unreinforced clay brick masonry, unreinforced stone masonry, reinforced concrete masonry, residential masonry veneer and churches; masonry infill was not part of this study. This paper focuses on the progress of the unreinforced masonry (URM) component of Project Masonry. To date the research team has completed raw data collection on over 600 URM buildings in the Christchurch area. The results from this study will be extremely relevant to Australian cities since URM buildings in New Zealand are similar to those in Australia.
