Editorial: Earthquake rebuilds not 'cheap fixes'

The repairs to Christchurch after the earthquake are still taking place.

I made a brief visit to Christchurch at the weekend where the earthquake rebuild is slowly continuing.

Since I moved away from Christchurch, I have returned several times each year to visit family.

Unfortunately, the scale of the rebuild job facing the city masks the progress made nearly three years on since the magnitude 6.3 shake killed 185 people.

The CBD lingers in a depressing state of perpetual vacancy.

The cracked and cordoned-off brick buildings which covered the city initially following the shake are gone.

So too are the piles of lifeless concrete rubble which sat scattered around them for months.

In their place, where the ruined hotels, bars and retailers once sat, are square and rectangular expanses of nothing.

The sites are devoid of anything at all, be it man- made or natural.

And the cost of it all is billions.

The Eketahuna earthquake, felt across Hawke's Bay just over a week ago, has triggered more than 1300 claims to the Earthquake Commission.

The Tararua District Council says work to restore earthquake damaged roads could cost up to $2 million.

Tararua District Council chief executive Blair King says they are not "cheap fixes".

Let's just hope they are manageable.