More earthquake tourism

I drove down Gloucester St today for the first time - it has been open for a while, but I haven't been interested until now, when I had to get across town quickly and needed to take the most direct route.

It is unrecognisable.  I stood on Gloucester St and took this photo looking north - east to the Colombo St corner - the tall building is the Forsyth Barr building.

 

And this is the Google Street Map view of the same intersection pre-quake:

I took a photo of the Isaac Theatre Royal on Gloucester St - the brick building to the right in the distance is the entrance/foyer, then there is a space/gap where the audience sat, then the building on the left is the stage - still standing, which a large shade curtain flapping in the breeze:

 The entrance to the Central Library:

 And the small arcade opposite:

Further round on Hereford St sits Shands Emporium - it had the best vintage clothing store upstairs, and is one of the oldest buildings in the CBD - it used to sit wedged between other buildings (again, a photo from Google):

But now it sits all alone.

Barely intact. I'm guessing the reason it is there at all is because of some sort of protection status, and hopefully it gets restored

Little-town

We drove over the Lyttelton this morning to pick up some supplies and the market and grab a coffee. It was actually kind of buzzing.  There is something about the view above that makes me always pick up my camera and take a photo.

There was an old piano set up on the main street, which Clem had a good old bang on...

And several small gardens planted amongst the rubble on empty sites..