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Clearances of Crown-owned residential red zone properties have picked up the pace with 2074 now completed and the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority on target to complete 3000 demolitions by the end of September, Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says.

“With 6059 properties in the red zone now sold to the Crown, work is now progressing more quickly,” Mr Brownlee says.

“Over the past 18 months our focus has been firmly on letting red zoned residents make decisions about the Crown offer.

Popular areas of central Christchurch will reopen to the public today with the latest reductions to the rebuild zone taking effect, Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says.

“From 11am the cordon will be reduced to allow a temporary pedestrian corridor through Cathedral Square from the Worcester Street Bridge to the intersection of Gloucester and Colombo Streets.

“It will remain open until demolition work in the Square prevents access.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee has used the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Act 2011 to ensure new urban areas will be covered by the same air quality rules that protect existing residential areas of the region.

Acting on an application from Environment Canterbury (Ecan), the Minister has used Section 27 of the CER Act to amend the Canterbury Natural Resources Regional Plan (NRRP) and redefine some of the region’s Clean Air Zones.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says he was very disappointed to learn at 2.21pm today that properties within the document sent by the Earthquake Commission to an unauthorised recipient on Friday contained more information than EQC first thought.

“I am also extremely concerned at the possibility recipients of the email may now be communicating the information to the Hon Lianne Dalziel, despite making a statutory declaration to destroy it,” Mr Brownlee says.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee has today kicked off physical work on the first of Christchurch’s highly anticipated new central city anchor projects.

Construction of the 3.2km long Avon River Precinct/Te Papa Otakaro has begun with work on the riverbank between the Antigua Boatsheds and Montreal Street.  Called Watermark, this first phase of development will be a guide to how the rest of the precinct will look.

A payment of nearly $31 million for civil defence emergency response costs related to the Canterbury earthquakes has been paid to the Christchurch City Council, Civil Defence Minister Nikki Kaye says.

This payment brings the total Government contribution paid to the Christchurch City Council to more than $208 million in response to the September 2010 and February, June and December 2011 earthquakes.

A newly appointed consortium has this week begun planning Christchurch’s world-class Health Precinct, Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee has announced.

The consortium led by companies BVN Donovan Hill and Jasmax has been selected from a group of 12 consortia that tendered to master plan the new hub for health education, research and innovation and delivery of health services to the public.

With the nights getting colder and winter on the doorstep Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says it’s time for the Christchurch City Council to pick up the pace and rapidly fix more of its social housing units.

“We all know the housing market in greater Christchurch is under degrees of pressure, no more so than in the area of low income rentals,” Mr Brownlee says.

“The Government has stepped up by properly resourcing Housing NZ and riding them hard to repair and re-let its most damaged stock.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says a foundation laying project that will get underway in the heart of central Christchurch early tomorrow is another positive step in the city’s rebuild.

“For 13 straight hours almost 750 cubic metres of concrete will be laid on the site of a new office building on the corner of High and Lichfield Streets, starting at 3am on Thursday,” Mr Brownlee says.

Good afternoon. Thank you for the invitation to be here with you as we remember the destructive and terrifying earthquake that struck this city and the surrounding areas two years ago today.

It claimed the lives of 185 people and because of that, February 22nd will always be a poignant day for the people of Canterbury.

I would like to acknowledge and welcome here the family and friends of those who lost their lives.

I know this is a difficult day for you.

Your grief is still raw and only time can help to numb the pain of your loss.

Cantabrians’ positivity and resilience has shone through in the results of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority’s 2012 Wellbeing Survey, Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says, with three quarters of residents saying life is good or extremely good.

Conducted for CERA by Nielsen Research between August and October 2012, the Wellbeing Survey garnered responses from 2381 residents selected randomly from the electoral roll in Christchurch city, the Waimakariri and Selwyn districts.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee today offered praise and thanks to all those who have worked so hard to create viable options and speed up the delivery of solutions for Christchurch residents on Technical Category 3 (TC3) land in greater Christchurch.

Mr Brownlee was speaking at the pouring of a new concrete foundation solution on a TC3 property in the Christchurch suburb of Hoon Hay.

With over half of all staff working inside Christchurch’s city cordon specifically concentrating on repair and construction, Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says the area can now be re-named the Rebuild Zone.

Mr Brownlee says using Wednesday this week as an example, the 1098 people working within the cordon represented interior design companies, painters, electricians, scaffolders and builders, as well as demolition companies.

Thank you all for being here today, inside the CBD cordon.

Rather than being known as the Red Zone – which denoted dangerous buildings and subsequent demolition – this will now be known by the CERA team as the Rebuild Zone, because frankly, that’s what’s going on.

I want to talk to you today about what’s happening in the city and what will happen over the coming years. First I’ll spend a little time reminding you why we’ve done some of the things we’ve done.

The owners of 47 commercial CBD properties have agreed to sell to the Crown as the purchase of central Christchurch land for new development gathers pace.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says contracts have been signed by 27 property owners and agreement in principle reached with another 20 owners.

“We’re finding land owners are willing to come to the table and negotiate in good faith with the Crown so that together we can progress the rebuilding of Christchurch’s CBD,” Mr Brownlee says.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says the children of Christchurch have a unique opportunity to help develop part of the new central city through the Amazing Place playground competition.

Competition packs have been distributed to every Canterbury school and early childhood centre, and schools have already begun registering to take part in the project, which has the Bank of New Zealand (BNZ) as its principal sponsor.

There are separate competitions for different age groups.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee and Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker have announced a joint accord deferring the Christchurch City Council’s Long Term Plan until 2015 to allow an earthquake recovery cost-sharing method to be mutually agreed. 

Instead the Council will undertake a new plan, to be called the Christchurch City Three Year Plan.

Mr Brownlee says this new planning process will give surety to Christchurch rate payers, the people of Christchurch, the New Zealand tax payer, the financial markets and development partners.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says the Government has accepted Environment Canterbury’s recommendation to change the water conservation order that covers the Rakaia River.

The change will allow TrustPower to release water from Lake Coleridge for irrigation when the river is low, increasing the reliability of the water supply.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says the Earthquake Commission’s Fletcher EQR-managed Canterbury Home Repair Programme has passed the billion dollar mark and is well on the way to completing 31,000 jobs.

“Every major work programme takes a period of months to ramp up to full capacity, with sourcing of contractors, training, securing of supply chains and in this case the logistics of evaluating the damage to so many homes,” Mr Brownlee says.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says a 40 tonne boulder that crashed through a house in the Port Hills last night is a graphic illustration of the ongoing unpredictability of the damaged land.

“This very vividly vindicates the time and effort spent establishing the risk of rock roll on the Port Hills,” Mr Brownlee says.

The giant boulder lodged under the Finnarsby Place house after crashing through the deck.

“This property is in the red zone and is now Crown-owned,” Mr Brownlee says.

Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says Christchurch businesspeople anxious to return to the CBD are understandably frustrated but should be heartened by the $145 million of consents issued over the past 10 months for construction projects inside the four avenues.

“This is a great vote of confidence from land owners that the Christchurch CBD has a healthy future, and I know those developing buildings will be equally anxious to give tenants a chance to move in,” Mr Brownlee says.

A three month extension to the final settlement date for a small group of residential red zone property owners will ease a number of pressures they are facing, Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee says.

The extension will apply to those property owners who under initial rules would have needed to settle with the Crown and vacate the red zone by 30 April 2013.

They will now be able to nominate a new settlement date up until 31 July 2013.

Transport Minister Gerry Brownlee has today opened the South Island’s first Road of National Significance, the Christchurch Southern Motorway Stage 1.

The $140 million, eight kilometre four-lane motorway and 2.5 km upgrade of Halswell Junction Road, which runs between Collins Street and Halswell Junction Road and then along Halswell Junction Road, was completed within three years – ahead of schedule and on budget.

Civil Defence Minister Chris Tremain says an interagency Corrective Action Plan released today will improve the strength of Civil Defence in New Zealand.

“An independent review of the response to the Christchurch earthquake on February 22 found overall that emergency services worked well. However a number of recommendations were made on how the process could be improved,” says Mr Tremain.