The Star: January 05, 2017

8
Thursday January 5 2017
News
Tsunami threat draws homeowners west
•From page 7
Statistics NZ has also predicted
the population could boom. Its
latest projections show 504,000
people could live in Christchurch
city by 2038 if migration stays
high and people continue to live
longer – up from 375,000 at last
count.
It projected even greater
growth in Selwyn, from 56,200
residents this year to 111,800 in
2038, and in Waimakariri from
52,300 to 95,100.
But others are more conservative.
When asked what he thought
would happen in Christchurch’s
future, Mr Cookson’s first
response was that he was a historian
– crystal ball-gazing was not
what he did.
But if we were to learn the lessons
of history, he said, we should
look at transport.
“I think there’s a real possibility
we’ll reach the end of the satellite
town development around
Christchurch, because the more
you built out of town the more
traffic you get going in and out
of town, so the more it becomes
inconvenient. At that point
more people will move back into
town,” he said.
That cycle had been seen in
New Brighton, where the town
was a thriving shopping hub
TRANSPORT: Crowds gathering around the trams in Cathedral Square in 1928, when the popular suburbs in Christchurch
were the ones close to the tram lines. Right: New Brighton was a major weekend shopping destination from the 1940s to 80s,
because shops in the city were closed, but it declined after Saturday trading was introduced in 1981.
while it was the only place shops
were allowed to open on the
weekend. When nationwide Saturday
trading was introduced in
the 80s, convenience won out and
its popularity dropped.
The same was seen in the central
city, after cars became cheaper
and more accessible. Suburban
malls began to boom, as people
no longer needed to take public
transport into the central city.
More recently, Addington had
become a hub for businesses
forced to move out of the central
city after the earthquakes.
Massey University pro vicechancellor
Paul Spoonley, an
expert in demography, said there
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were several things that could
dramatically change the shape of
cities.
Large businesses could have a
big effect, he said, as if they chose
to base themselves in an area they
brought with them hundreds of
employees who wanted to live
and shop close to work.
The number of immigrants
who moved to help with the
rebuild would also be having an
effect, he said.
“They tend to live in areas New
Zealanders will traditionally not
want to live in, like high density
areas they are often quite used
to,” he said.
Historically, the popularity of
business and retail areas in
Christchurch had risen and fallen
a lot more than it had for residential
areas, which had not changed
much at all, Mr Cookson said.
Sumner had always been
considered a lot more “posh”
than New Brighton, Fendalton
and Merivale were always sought
after, and areas like Linwood and
Sydenham less desirable, he said.
“I think on the whole it has
stayed fairly stable. There’s not
been a whole lot of gentrification
of suburbs,” he said.
If there had been more movement
toward developing innercity
suburbs like Linwood after
the earthquakes, he believed there
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may have been more change.
But the boom in the Selwyn and
Waimakariri districts had taken a
lot of residents and a lot of investment
out of the city, he said.
While the threat of another
earthquake or a tsunami might
have drawn people toward the
west, he believed that had less
of an impact on people’s choices
than other factors, like good
schools or convenience.
Few people in Christchurch’s
early days seemed to consider the
earthquake risk when they were
choosing where to live, he said.
“I think we lived in profound
ignorance of how unstable
Christchurch was,” he said.
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