By David Gooselink
More than a hundred architects and designers worked against the clock this weekend as they tried their hand at redesigning Christchurch.
Five damaged sites were chosen for the 48 hour challenge, which was aimed at getting fresh ideas to help regenerate the city.
Some of the country's top architects, engineers, and urban designers were in attendance.
They'd gathered at Lincoln University to put their heads together for the future of Christchurch.
Central City Plan’s Susan McLaughlin says wants “the teams to really wow us”.
“We really want to see, what we can do in the 21st century Christchurch rebuild.”
The challenge was compressing what's normally months of work into just 48 hours.
That left little time for sleep, with stress levels rising as the deadline approached.
Chris Owen of the Landmark team says it was “fairly intense, a lot of fast thinking and a lot of clock watching”.
And many teams were cutting it fine.
Neil Challenger, team member for Lincoln University, “stayed up all night” working on a last minute submission.
“But it's a good submission so we're pleased with what we're handing in.”
Rebuilding Cathedral Square was the focus of Australian team Arup Opus 2, which believes Christchurch can be a leader in the Pacific.
“With the massive building programme that has to happen here, it can actually really become a centre of excellence for that kind of construction,” says Andrew Wisdom.
Others looked at new construction methods, including a timber ‘damage avoidance system’.
“That basically if there's an earthquake that comes along, it's going to sort of shake the building. And the building's going to re-right itself and you should be able to go back into that building a few hours later,” says New Zealand Wood team member, Jason Guiver.
The final ideas will be assessed by the Christchurch City Council and the actual owners of some of the affected buildings. They have the real potential to be included as part of the city's mammoth rebuild effort.
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