A photograph of workers searching for survivors in the collapsed stores along Manchester Street shortly after the 22 February 2011 earthquake. An excavator can be seen helping to remove rubble from the site.
An aerial photograph of Victoria Square and the Crowne Plaza Hotel.
Photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "Hotel Grand Chancellor car park demolition".
A photograph of the Excelsior Hotel building site on Manchester Street. The remaining facade is being held up by a stack of shipping containers and a mural can be seen on a wall in the distance.
A photograph looking west down Lichfield Street, from an empty site on the corner of Madras Street. An old painted sign on the side of the brick building on the right reads 'McCormick Reapers & Binders'.
A photograph looking west down Lichfield Street, from an empty site on the corner of Madras Street. An old painted sign on the side of the brick building on the right reads 'McCormick Reapers & Binders'.
A photograph looking west down Lichfield Street, from an empty site on the corner of Madras Street. An old painted sign on the side of the brick building on the right reads 'McCormick Reapers & Binders'.
Photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "Running repairs on the huge hydraulic nibbler".
A photograph of workers searching for survivors in the collapsed stores along Manchester Street shortly after the 22 February 2011 earthquake. An excavator can be seen helping to remove rubble from the site.
The Arts Centre photographed shortly after the 22 February 2011 earthquake. A large crack can be seen in the tower and part of the brickwork around the clock has collapsed onto the pavement below. Scaffolding was placed up against the building after the 4 September 2010 earthquake and the gable was braced with wooden planks. This probably limited the damage to this part of the building. The building has been cordoned off with tape reading, 'Danger keep out'. A sign in front of the door reads, 'Site closed'.
A photograph taken from Oxford Terrace, looking across a cleared site to the corner of Gloucester Street and Colombo Street. ChristChurch Cathedral and the Novotel building can be seen in the distance.
A photograph taken from Oxford Terrace, looking across a cleared site to the corner of Gloucester Street and Colombo Street. ChristChurch Cathedral and the Novotel building can be seen in the distance.
A photograph taken from Oxford Terrace, looking across a cleared site to the corner of Gloucester Street and Colombo Street. ChristChurch Cathedral and the Novotel building can be seen in the distance.
A photograph taken from Oxford Terrace, looking across a cleared site to the corner of Gloucester Street and Colombo Street. ChristChurch Cathedral and the Novotel building can be seen in the distance.
A photograph taken from Oxford Terrace, looking across a cleared site to the corner of Gloucester Street and Colombo Street. ChristChurch Cathedral and the Novotel building can be seen in the distance.
The rapid classification of building damage states or placards after an earthquake is vital for enabling an efficient emergency response and informed decision-making for rehabilitation and recovery purposes. Traditional methods rely heavily on inspector-led on-site surveys, which are often time-consuming, resource-intensive, and susceptible to human error. This study introduces a machine learning-supported surrogate model designed to streamline the assessment of building damage, focusing on the automated assignment of damage placards within the context of New Zealand's post-earthquake evaluation frameworks. The study evaluates two key safety evaluation protocols—Rapid Building Assessment (RBA) and Detailed Damage Evaluation (DDE)—and integrates corresponding databases derived from the 2010–2011 Canterbury Earthquake Sequence (CES) in Christchurch. Six ML classifiers—Multilayer Perceptron (MLP), Random Forest (RF), Support Vector Machine (SVM), K-Nearest Neighbours (KNN), Gradient Boosting Classifier (GBC), and Gradient Bagging (GBag)—were rigorously tested across both databases. The results indicate that the RF-based surrogate model outperforms the other classifiers across both RBA and DDE protocols. Two distinct sets of critical predictors have been further identified for each protocol, allowing for the rapid retrieval of essential data for future on-site surveys, while retaining the RF model's predictive accuracy. The developed surrogate model provides a pragmatic tool for practising engineers to rapidly assign placards to damaged structures and for policymakers and building owners to make informed recovery decisions for earthquake-affected buildings.
A view across Canterbury Street in Lyttelton to The Volcano Cafe and The Lava Bar. Masonry from the buildings has collapsed onto the footpath, and the site has been cordoned off by a safety fence.
Photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "A worker clad in protective gear is dwarfed by the big trucks and diggers working on the demolition site of the building on the corner of Gloucester and Colombo Streets".
The structure of the 10 square metre office building which is to serve as Gap Filler Headquarters is almost complete. A sign on the front reads, "Gap Filler project in progress on this site".
A photograph of members of the public walking along Gloucester Street near the Colombo Street intersection. In the background, the site of the demolished Farmers Building can be seen as well as the car park to the left.
A view from Colombo Street looking towards the overhead walkway that runs between the Crossing building and Ballantynes. A 'No entry' sign stands between orange barriers that are blocking off the road. To the right is a vacant demolition site.
Photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "The remains of SBS House, on the south-east corner of Worcester and Manchester Streets".
A photograph of a shipping container used as a site office on Hereford Street. In front of the container are two Port-a-loos, and chairs taken from surrounding buildings sit on the footpath to be used as a staff break area.
A photograph of a mural on a wall in the former site of a building on Norwich Quay in Lyttelton. Sections of reinforcing steel and other construction material have been laid up against the mural.
Photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "Looking from Gloucester Street across the demolition site of the Coachman towards the Heritage Hotel in Cathedral Square with Hotel Grand Chancellor (left background)".
A photograph of a mural on a wall in the former site of a building on Norwich Quay in Lyttelton. A skip, several pallets, and other construction material have been placed in front of the mural.
An aerial photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "Victoria Square is at the centre of this picture with its green lawns and trees. The bare patch of earth in front s the demolition sites of the Allan McLean building, the Oxford on Avon, and Plunket House. The contract to demolish the Crowne Plaza Hotel has been let, while the fate of the Town Hall is still undecided. The Convention Centre is coming down. On the very bottom, slightly to the right is the Medlab building which is also to be demolished. In the bottom left corner is the PWC building which is also to be demolished".
Students from CPIT on the site of the demolished JetSet lounge. They are building a 1950s style bowling alley for the community to use. They have been photographed from beside the Passing Time sculpture on Wilson Reserve.
A pile of rubble on the corner of Manchester and Worcester Streets. In the background, the Design and Arts College and the Heritage Hotel can be seen.
Photograph captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "The remains of SBS House, on the south-east corner of Worcester and Manchester Streets. The Octagon Live is behind".