Christchurch Central City

This area looks pretty calm now, but it went through a lot. This is Christchurch Central City, the heart of Christchurch, New Zealand, defined by the Four Avenues. It includes the built-up central city, some less dense areas, and green spaces like Hagley Park and the Botanic Gardens.

It was hit hard by the September 2010 Canterbury earthquake, then devastated five months later by the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake. After that second quake, the Central City Red Zone was set up, and it stayed inaccessible to most people until June 2013. They did consider moving the city center elsewhere, but that was seen as uneconomical and unnecessary, especially since the rebuilt center would meet modern building standards to withstand future quakes.

The land here was formed by gravel and sediment over the last 7,000 years. Right at the center is Cathedral Square, surrounding Christ Church, the Anglican cathedral. The area around this square and within the four avenues is considered the central business district. The city center is mostly a grid, broken up by the curve of the Avon River / Ōtākaro, and two diagonal streets: High Street and Victoria Street. Christchurch has four pairs of one-way streets. The grid within the outer one-way streets is really regular; that's the part laid out in the original survey. The area between those outer one-way streets and the avenues was developed later, so it's less regular.

Like most of the city, it’s pretty flat here. Before the earthquakes, there were a lot of high-rise buildings, but many were torn down after 2011. Buildings like Pacific Tower and Forsyth Barr Building are still standing, and they stand out against the skyline.

Māori were here first, with settlements near the estuary and along the Avon and Heathcote Rivers. There were two kāinga right here in Central Christchurch: Puāri near Victoria Square, which was important for gathering food, and Tautahi Pā, a bit further east.

European settlement was started by the Canterbury Association in 1848. Captain Joseph Thomas initially planned the main town at Lyttelton Harbour, but there wasn't enough flat land. So, he moved Christchurch to where he had previously planned a town called 'Stratford', on the Avon where the river met higher ground. Back then, the Avon River was navigable up to 'The Bricks', just upstream of the Barbadoes Street bridge. There’s a cairn marking that spot today. That name came from the Deans Brothers unloading bricks there in the 1840s for their homestead further up the river.

Christchurch is one of only four cities in the world planned with a central city square, four surrounding squares, and parklands. Philadelphia was first, then Savannah, Adelaide, and then Christchurch. So, this place has quite a legacy. Thomas's plan for Christchurch was a standard rectangular grid, laid out by Edward Jollie by March 1850. Thomas didn't want crescents for variety, but the Avon River cut across the site, and High Street/Ferry Road and Victoria Street/Papanui Road also broke up the grid. The very center was a cross-shaped 'Square' for the cathedral and grammar school. East and north-west of that were two more 'squares'—Latimer and Cranmer Squares—which are actually rectangles, placed in relation to the diagonal of the Ōtākaro. The grid was originally between Salisbury Street to the north and St Asaph Street to the south, and Barbadoes Street to the east and Rolleston Avenue/Park Terrace to the west. Between these streets and the North, East, and South Town Belts, which are now Bealey, Fitzgerald, and Moorhouse Avenues, were 'town reserves' that were