Whether you share your home with one or not, they say that you’re either a cat person or a dog person. Hamish’s mid-week ‘hands up if you’re a dog person or a cat person’ office poll revealed that most of … Continue reading →
It’s been a busy month for Underground Overground Archaeology as we’ve been actively involved in New Zealand Archaeology Week 2018 running displays, historical tours, and talks – all of them highly successful thanks to history and archaeology lovers across the … Continue reading →
‘If you dig a hole through the centre of the Earth, you would arrive in New Zealand’. As Spanish children, we learnt that at school. Spain is the Antipodes of New Zealand. Both countries are at the same time joined … Continue reading →
When people first settled in Aotearoa, they had no idea that they were sitting upon a slice of one of two supercontinents; Gondwanaland. Around eighty-three million years ago this slice we now live on, known to us as Zealandia, broke … Continue reading →
And just like that another year has passed us by. 2018 has been a year of changes here at Underground Overground. It’s with a very heavy heart we’ve said a few goodbyes to some tremendously talented archaeologists; Chelsea, Shana, Matt, … Continue reading →
Have you always wanted to travel the world? See the famous cathedrals of Europe? Smell the streets of China? Taste the spices of India? But travelling is expensive and everything’s just so damn far away, right? Well have we got … Continue reading →
As a 90s baby millennial, Helen Clark was Prime Minister from the time I started primary school to the time I started high school. I grew up in a world where in the eyes of a child there was never … Continue reading →
The dinner party; a minefield of social etiquette and proper behaviour for both the host and the guests. For the host – the pressure of who to invite, where to sit them, what to serve them? Having the right invitation … Continue reading →
One of the most fascinating things about studying and interpreting the past is the possibilities it holds. Could the broken tea cup I’ve found been smashed against a wall in a fit of rage after a wife found her husband … Continue reading →
Bones, of the animal variety, are a common find on historic archaeological sites in Christchurch. The vast majority of the bones we come across are sheep and cattle, with the occasional pig and chicken showing up as well. From these … Continue reading →
The word archaeology comes from the Greek archaia (“ancient things”) and logos (“theory” or “science”). So, archaeologists study past societies through the material culture. In other words, we write the history analysing what people threw away or left behind. That’s … Continue reading →
The ideal Victorian woman In Victorian society, a woman was to be meek, mild, virtuous and peaceful (Whiteside 2007). She was expected to marry and have children. She would stay at home, looking after her children and her husband and … Continue reading →
Being a Roman archaeologist by trade, wherever I go in the world I seem to sniff out some classical antiquities. Some call it a talent, some call it an obsession (I’ll leave that to you to decide…). There’s something about … Continue reading →
Today we would like to take you through some art work created by our team over the years. But this isn’t for your local charity art auction – these images illustrate the archaeological process we undertake on a daily basis. … Continue reading →
Christchurch is rightly or wrongly traditionally thought of as an English city, but at every turn we can see a glimpse of England’s arch enemy…the Scots. While they may now technically be at peace, they do still meet annually on … Continue reading →
Lyttelton is a fun and exciting place to do archaeology. I’ve been lucky enough to get to do a bit of archaeology in Lyttelton in the last few months, mainly out in the road, because of the digging that’s been … Continue reading →
“It must have been a happy household,” was the remark made by one of our team members when she saw the artefact assemblage we are discussing on today’s blog post. Whilst children’s artefacts are relatively common finds on New Zealand … Continue reading →
It seems almost expected now that many of us will go on semi-frequent overseas jaunts and visit the spectacular local scenery that New Zealand has to offer. However, most of us probably don’t often think about when these destinations became … Continue reading →
Today, art is my inspiration, at least as a starting point. The title of this blog post may seem whimsical, but it is both a practical description of our subject today and a reference to the art of centuries past. … Continue reading →
We have published previously on the importance of buildings, be they residential or commercial, as an artefact in understanding 19th century culture in New Zealand. While it’s easy to overlook the humble cottage as a source of archaeological data, houses … Continue reading →
Underfloor deposits are as exasperating as they are exciting. Exasperating because the context is not particularly secure: objects usually accumulate under a house over time (thrown or swept from the outside, lost or dropped between the floorboards, dragged in by … Continue reading →
In 1848, when the City of Christchurch was nothing but a design concept of the Canterbury Association back in London the idea of a ‘little slice of England’ (but half the world away) was born (Rice 2014, 9). Exactly how … Continue reading →
The quality of public space is vital to livable cities. Yet livable cities also require empowered communities. This thesis asks: how is the landscape architect’s design expertise expressed as part of the public participation process, what are the key features of design expertise that lead to an effective design-based participation process and how does quality in the participation process relate to the quality of design outcomes? A theoretical framework is developed from which to clarify the relationship between decision-making processes in design and public participation. Insights from design theory are combined with the findings of key informant interviews with New Zealand and Northern Europe design experts, and with landscape architects, community and Council staff working in post-earthquake Ōtautahi/Christchurch, Aotearoa/New Zealand. Results of a case study of Albion Square in Ōhinehou/Lyttelton reveal that the designer’s interactions with the public play a critical role in shaping elegant design outcomes in public space design. Four key insights reveal that participatory design processes in New Zealand need to be reconsidered in order to enable landscape architects to work more closely with communities in mutual learning, rather than the currently limiting technical problem solving process. Institutional, professional and theoretical implications are drawn from the findings.
This report forms part of a research project examining rural community resilience to natural hazard events, with a particular focus on transient population groups. A preliminary desktop and scoping exercise was undertaken to examine nine communities affected by the Kaikoura earthquake and to identify the variety of transient population groups that are commonly (and increasingly) found in rural New Zealand (see Wilson & Simmons, 2017). From this, four case study communities – Blenheim, Kaikoura, Waiau and St Arnaud – were selected to represent a range of settlement types. These communities varied in respect of social, economic and geographic features, including the presence of particular transient population groups, and earthquake impact. While the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake provided a natural hazard event on which to focus the research, the research interest was in long-term (and broad) community resilience, rather than short-term (and specific) response and recovery actions which occurred post-earthquake.
This study is a qualitative investigation into the decision-making behaviour of commercial property owners (investors and developers) who are rebuilding in a city centre after a major disaster. In 2010/2011, Christchurch, the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, was a site of numerous earthquakes. The stronger earthquakes destroyed many buildings and public infrastructure in the commercial inner city. As a result, affected property owners lost all or most of their buildings, a significant proportion of which were old and in the last phase of their life span. They had to negotiate pay-outs with insurance companies and decide, once paid out, whether they should rebuild in Christchurch or sell up and invest elsewhere. The clear majority of those who decided to reinvest in and rebuild the city are ‘locals’, almost all of whom had no prior experience of property development. Thus, in a post-disaster environment, most of these property owners have transitioned from being just being passive investors to active property developers. Their experience was interpreted using primary data gathered from in-depth and semi-structured interviews with twenty-one “informed property people” who included commercial property owners; property agents or consultants; representatives of public-sector agencies and financial institutions. The study findings showed that the decision-making behaviour of property investors and developers rebuilding after a major disaster did not necessarily follow a strict financial or profit motive as prescribed in the mainstream or neo-classical economics property literature. Rather, their decision-making behaviour has been largely shaped by emotional connections and external factors associated with their immediate environment. The theoretical proposition emerging from this study is that after a major disaster, local urban property owners are faced with two choices “to stay” or “to go”. Those who decide to stay and rebuild are typically very committed individuals who have a feeling of ownership, belonging and attachment to the city in which they live and work. These are people who will often take the lead in commercial property development, proactively making decisions and seeking positive investment outcomes for themselves which in turn result in revitalised commercial urban precincts
Livelihood holds the key to a rapid recovery following a large-scale devastating disaster, building its resilience is of paramount importance. While much attention has been given to how to help people who are displaced from their jobs to regain employment, little research on livelihood resilience has been undertaken for those relocated communities following a disaster event. By studying five re-located villages post-2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami in Banda Aceh and Aceh Besar, Indonesia, this research has identified the indicators of livelihood resilience and the critical factors driving it for post-disaster relocated communities. A mixed approach, combining questionnaire surveys, semistructured interviews, and field observations, was used for the collection of data. Housing entitlement, the physical and mental health of residents, access to external livelihood support and the provision of infrastructure and basic services were identified as amongst the most critical indicators that represent the level of livelihood resilience. Early recovery income support, physical and mental health, availability and timeliness of livelihood support, together with cultural sensitivity and governance structure, are amongst the most important factors. Given the nature of resettlement, access to infrastructure, location of relocated sites, the safety of the neighbourhood and the ability to transfer to other jobs/skills also play an important role in establishing sustained employment for relocated communities in Indonesia. Those indicators and factors were synthesised into a framework which was further tested in the recovery of Christchurch, and Kaikoura, New Zealand during their recovery from devastating earthquakes. It is suggested that the framework can be used by government agencies and aid organisations to assess the livelihood resilience of post-disaster relocated communities. This will help better them plan support policies and/or prioritise resilience investment strategies to ensure that the recovery needs of those relocated are best met
Following the 2010/2011 Canterbury (New Zealand) earthquakes the seismic design of buildings with precast concrete panels has received significant attention. Although this form of construction generally performed adequately in Christchurch, there were a considerable number of precast concrete panel connection failures. This observation prompted a review of more than 4700 panel details to establish representative details used in both existing and new multi-storey and low rise industrial precast concrete buildings. The detailing and quantity of each reviewed connection type in the sampled data is reported, and advantages and potential deficiencies of each connection type are discussed. Following the Canterbury earthquakes, it was observed that brittle failure had occurred in some grouted metal duct connections used for precast concrete wall panels, resulting in recommendations for more robust detailing of this connection type. A set of experimental tests was subsequently performed to investigate the in-plane seismic behaviour of precast concrete wall panel connections. This testing comprised of seven reversed cyclic in-plane tests of fullscale precast concrete wall panels having wall-to-foundation grouted metal duct connections. Walls with existing connection detailing were found to perform adequately when carrying low axial loads, but performance was found to be less satisfactory as the axial load and wall panel length increased. The use of new recommended detailing was observed to prevent brittle connection response and to improve the robustness of the reinforcement splice. A parametric investigation was conducted using the finite element method to predict the failure mode of metal duct connections. From the results of the parametric study on metal duct connections it was identified that there were three possible failure modes, being reinforcement fracture, concrete spalling without metal duct pull out, and concrete spalling with metal duct pull-out. An alternative simple analytical method was proposed in order to determine the type of connection failure without using a time-consuming finite element method. Grouted sleeves inserts are an alternative connector that is widely used to connect wall panels to the foundations. The two full-scale wall panels were subjected to reversed cyclic in-plane demands until failure of either the connection or the wall panel. Wall panel failure was due to a combination of connection reinforcement pulling-out from the coupler and reinforcement fracture. In addition, non-embedded grouted sleeve tests filled with different quality of grout were conducted by subjecting these coupler assemblages to cyclic and monotonic forces
The public policy think tank, the New Zealand Initiative, says this country is still under-prepared for the next big earthquake. The group of economists has reviewed the policy response to the Canterbury earthquakes and has just released its report: Recipe for disaster: Building policy on shaky ground. It says recovery from the quakes was hindered by avoidable policy mistakes that still haven't been addressed. One of the report's co authors Dr Eric Crampton joins Susie Ferguson to discuss the issues.
Nikki Ross is still waiting on an insurance settlement almost seven years after her family home was damaged in the February, 2011 Christchurch earthquake. Trish Keith from EQC says they're hoping to offer the family a settlement in the next three weeks.
The woman who guided the Christchurch Art Gallery through the "earthquake years" is our guest today. Jenny Harper is retiring from the gallery in March and she shares her favourite books and things with Jesse.