Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Darryl August: Institute of Building Surveyors President on the new earthquake-prone building standards

Transcript

Darryl August: Institute of Building Surveyors President on the new earthquake-prone building standards · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The earthquake changes, thousands of buildings will no longer be
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: classified as high risk. Only three story plus concrete buildings
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: all those with unreinforced masonry like brick walls will now
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: require full upgrades. And he's get on an Institute of
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Building Survey as President Daryl august with me this morning, Darreel.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: Good morning, Good morning, Ran. How are you good?
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Good? Thank you. Thoughts on this.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Look at obviously a positive move for a lot of
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: owners in New Zealand that crippled with the fact that
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: they're going to have to spend a lot of money
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: where we're going to have to spend a lot of
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: money on their buildings to upgrade them. However, we do
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: have some concerns around just making sure that we don't
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: go too far and making sure that you know the
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: right measures are in place. Still, the removal of the
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: need to look at other building elements such as fire
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: and accessibility does concern us somewhat, and I think when
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: I read through the media release it does confused me
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: slightly where it says that owners won't need to address
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: those items, but then it also says that the territorial
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: authority will still need to check those items, So the
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: two don't really match at the moment, but obviously the
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: devils in the detail. When we see more, we'll be
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: able to tell what the consequences are of those changes.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: So you're saying it's not necessarily the earthquake stuff, but
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: it's what fire escapes and wheelchair ramps and stuff.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: Well. Look, accessibility is obviously a concern for people who
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: require accessibility means to enter a building, but in terms
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: of fire, that's a pretty critical safety item within a building,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: fire performance alarms and passivefire requirements. So generally with a
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: seismic upgrade to a building, there would be other building
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: elements that do require remediation as well, and that's quite common.
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: So what the government's looking to do here is removed
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: the need to upgrade those systems. I'm not sure exactly
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: how much detail there is at the moment on what
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: that all looks like, but a standard approach of a
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: mediation of assignment building or building assitemic issues would be
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: that you know, a fire engineer would be involved in
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: do it gap analysis report of the building and be
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: able to tell the owners how it complies currently with
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: the building code and what it may need to do
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: to comply with any other provisions of the Building Code.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: Now, all the changes that they have made on earthquakes,
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: where does that put us in terms of global rankings?
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: You know, how safe would the buildings be here and
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: relative to earth great risk versus other places.
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: Look, I wouldn't be able to say. I don't work internationally,
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: so you know my expertise is in New Zealand. What
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: I would say is that I do have some concern
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: about the removal of seismic upgrade to buildings and low
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: risk areas. I suppose I did hear something on your
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: news bulletin earlier today where somebody was talking about if
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: you remove those requirements in low risk areas, what happens
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: if something happened similar to what happened in Australia a
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: few years ago in a low risk area where it
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: earthquake did it? And so when we look at Auckland,
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: and I'm not trying to scaremonger here, but if something
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: did happen in Auckland, that could significantly cripple our country.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: So I think building owners need to be cognizant of
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: the changes and if they feel that there are things
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: that need to be done to their building. There is
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: nothing stopping them doing work to their building if they
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: are concerned about it.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: Darrell, appreciate your time. Darryl August, who's with the New
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: Zealand Institute of Building Survey as their president.
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen live
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: news Talks. It'd be from five am weekdays, or follow
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: the podcast on iHeartRadio