The Wellington City Council
is working to restrain a quake-damaged lift shaft of a parking building
which is feared could come down in an aftershock.
Council earthquake resilience manager Neville Brown
says steel bracing was being put in to help keep the shaft on Lukes Lane
in place and the area will be closed for several days.
The shaft was one of a number of structures damaged in Sunday's 6.5 magnitude earthquake.
Mr Brown says the council would do the work first
"in the interest of public safety" and then talk to the building's owner
afterward about the cost.
"We will count the cost when the crane comes down."
The shaft, which is on a lean, has forced the
closure of some businesses while the work is completed and the council
has also asked residents to evacuate.
"The reason we've evacuated the surrounding
buildings is that we don't know how far it will fall, but if it did it
would be in this direction. So we're kind of protecting a fall zone,
rather than anything else."
"Most people were sensible and evacuated in light of
the request, we can't order them to go, but we've strongly advocated
that they move until the work is done."
Among the residents that have not left the area is Victoria university student Mark Lovelock.
Mr Lovelock and his flatmates live on the top floor
of Trojan House, which is on Lukes Lane. He says his flat received an
evacuation letter but they've decided to stay.
"This is our home, it's where we live, so we're going to ride it out. It's only going to take a few days."
Mr
Lovelock and his flatmates are architects and building science majors
so did their own calculations of how the shaft might fall.
"We did a bit of simple trigonometry and our landlord's office would get hit before ours, so we've decided to stay."
Downtown Community Ministry had only two-and-a-half hours to evacuate their office which is in the shadow of the lift shaft.
DCM director Stephanie McIntyre says the evacuation was used as a training exercise for a bigger disaster.
"What
we're trying to do is prepare ourselves for the day when we don't even
get back into the office in the first place and have to operate remotely
from somewhere else."
"We want to be in a situation where we can, without missing a beat, can be open for services," she says.
Before
evacuating, staff were given boxes to put their important things, but
Ms McIntyre says there was a "long list" of things that had been
forgotten.
Mr Brown says it was not the council's job to demolish the lift shaft because it is private property.
"[It's] up to the owner. Long-term he needs to make more permanent repairs, which may include demolition."
The work was being done on the advice of GNS Science to make sure the shaft is secured and does not cause damage, he said.
3 News
Online Reporter
Friday 26 Jul 2013 9:16a.m.
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