Resilience in Between

Abstract

The thesis investigates the implication of resilience thinking in the rebuild of Christchurch Central City after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake. Given the fact the Christchurch is earthquake prone, the future built environment must accommodate unexpected changes and disturbances. The research throughout the thesis recognises that the opportunity to enhance urban resilience relies on the interrelationship between open spaces and buildings, in particular, the diversity of open spaces. The problem here is that when it comes to the rebuild of cities that have suffered natural disasters, buildings are essential to attract business back into the city and to keep it functioning, this resulting in compact built environment with lesser and bigger buildings.These large-scale buildings, in return, reduce the benefit of open spaces, make the built environment overly simplified and rigid, and impact on the city’s resilience capacity to adapt changes. Currently, Christchurch CentralCity’s built environment has a degree of looseness, many vacant lots where construction is restricted have been used for by carparks and temporary projects organised by community initiatives. However, they are slowing replacing by large commercial buildings. This brings about the question of how the built environment retain the looseness while accommodating a diverse range of functions and activities in the vacant spaces generated by the earthquake. The thesis proposes a bottom-up approach, where space are flexible and adaptable so residents can make their own space to meet their future demands.