Heritage advocates want more historic buildings to be protected from demolition in emergencies

Thursday, 22 November 2018

Seventeen year-old Christs College student Geoff Horsburgh plays the bag pipes in front of the Cranmer Centre in central Christcurch, one of the category one heritage buildings lost to the Canterbury earthquakes in 2011.

Heritage advocates, Historic Places Aotearoa, want more heritage buildings to be protected from demolition in emergencies, its submission on the Building Amendment Bill says.

The bill, currently at select committee, adds emergency powers to and amends the Building Act 2004 to improve systems for managing damaged dangerous buildings in emergencies and for investigating building failures.

It protects category one buildings and wahi tupuna, places of significance to Maori, listed with Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga (HNZPT) from demolition in emergencies without ministerial approval.

Heritage NZ has 1017 historic places listed as category one and seven wahi tupuna sites.

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The Albert Hotel, Hasting's oldest building, built in 1882, a category two historic place, was demolished in 2015.

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It has another 4401 historic places listed as category two which would not be protected by the bill.

Historic Places Aotearoa, and a member organisation Historic Places Canterbury, want the protection in the bill widened to include top tier or highly significant heritage buildings scheduled in territorial authorities' district plans.

It is not clear how many more that would add.

The bill says 'a responsible person', like a territorial authority, must obtain ministerial approval to demolish completely or in part a dangerous damaged heritage building if it is a category one heritage building, a National Landmark building or wahi tupuna, places of ancestral and cultural significance for Maori.

The Albion Hotel, built in 1916 in Shannon, was a category two historic place that was demolished in 2013 after fire destroyed much of it.

A paramount principle in the bill is to protect the safety of the public from dangerous damaged buildings in an emergency or disaster.

Heritage NZ, whose role is to protect New Zealand's heritage, did not make a submission on the bill and considered it provided appropriate protection for New Zealand's heritage.

Director of policy Rebecca O'Brien said the organisation worked closely with the Ministry for Culture and Heritage during development of the bill to ensure that New Zealand's heritage was given careful consideration and provided for appropriately.

Its advice had been informed by its experiences of assessing damaged buildings following the Canterbury Earthquakes.

Warner's Hotel and The Press buildings in Cathedral Square, Christchurch, were both category one historic places so damaged by earthquakes they were demolished in 2011.

'HNZPT is pleased at the provisions proposed to date and the progress they represent in providing appropriate protection for New Zealand's heritage.'

However, Historic Places Aotearoa (HPA) and Historic Places Canterbury, disagree

HPA said too often demolition was seen as the only solution to public protection after a disaster.

It was the territorial authorities' heritage schedules that had standing under the Resource Management Act.

The bill's proposals might set aside RMA processes in emergencies, so it was essential the schedules were considered in the bill's proposals, HPA argued.

Much of the country's heritage was scheduled in territorial authorities' district plans, it said.

In most cities there were significant heritage buildings scheduled in district plans that were either not listed by Heritage NZ, or were listed as category two.

Moreover, heritage buildings were a critical resource and a source of identity in small towns but few or none might be listed as category one.

Heritage NZ tracks the total number of heritage places scheduled by territorial authorities across the country.

At 21 November, it said there were almost 14,000, but it does not report on how many of those were top tier or highly significant.

Heritage NZ said research indicated there was likely to be a strong overlap between category one, national landmarks and wahi tupuna on Heritage NZ's list and places scheduled in territorial authority plans as top tier or highly significant heritage buildings.

It said Heritage NZ's list had 5,731 entries of cultural and historical significance. Some 88 per cent of those were also scheduled in territorial authorities' plans, and almost all (96 per cent) of category one historic places were scheduled in the plans.

Christchurch lost a large proportion of its heritage buildings following the Canterbury Earthquakes. Heritage specialist and lawyer Mark Christensen said back in 2014 that 43 per cent of central Christchurch heritage buildings listed with Heritage NZ had been pulled down.