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The purpose of this paper is to understand how framing messages about earthquake risk affect judgements about legislation requiring the strengthening of earthquake-prone buildings.

Scenarios described the legislation with a general population sample (n=271). Two types of framing effects were examined in a 2 (valence frame: positive or negative or positive) by 2 (numerical format frame: frequency/number or percentage) experimental design.

Scenarios reporting the number of earthquake-prone buildings (negative frequency format) increased support for the earthquake-strengthening legislation more than the same message framed positively (frequency number of resilient building) or as a percentage. Demographic variables such as previous earthquake experience and gender interacted with the framing effects, and other variables also predicted support for the legislation were identified.

These results have direct implications for the use of framing effects messages in communications about earthquake risk and the wider domain.

This is the first study to show that the way the risk is framed affects citizens’ judgement of the value of earthquake legislation.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the changes in commercial office occupiers’ preferences in their building choice as a result of a recent natural disaster which triggered policy changes in building safety.

This study follows a qualitative research design comprising semi-structured one-on-one interviews with 24 property professionals (commercial leasing agents and property managers) in Auckland, New Zealand. A thematic analysis was employed for identifying, analysing and reporting themes emerged within data.

Tenants across New Zealand now incorporate earthquake issues in their leasing decisions. Most tenants are familiar with the impending policy changes related to earthquake-prone buildings. The degree to which building standards are incorporated into office occupiers’ choice varies with the size of the organisation and their willingness to invest in their corporate social responsibility. A certain level of overreaction was observed in tenants’ behaviour in the face of risk and uncertainty following the earthquakes. However, risk appears to be subsiding and emphasis is placed on availability of space in desirable locations.

The findings are limited due to a non-random sample selection and a small sample size. Further quantitative research is required to determine if office tenants place a premium on occupying seismically safe buildings since forthcoming regulatory changes have been announced.

This study provides evidence that imminent building policy changes are efficient in raising public awareness and informing perceptions of potential losses following a recent natural disaster event. Building owners can potentially capitalise on tenants’ desire to occupy high quality space.

This is the first study that develops the knowledge base identifying the perceptions of tenants about seismic safety of buildings since the Canterbury earthquakes. The study also contributes to the literature on the market effect of policy changes triggered by a focusing event.

The purpose of this article is to assist facilities asset managers who are dealing with regulatory environments pertaining to earthquakes and buildings. These professionals can learn a great deal from the successes and short-comings of a case study programme from the Auckland Council Property Department (ACPD), which manages the public facilities portfolio for the largest local administrative region in New Zealand in both population and landmass.

ACPD has initiated its response to New Zealand’s earthquake mitigation mandates by identifying buildings most at risk to an earthquake in its large and varied portfolio through the use of a rapid building evaluation programme strategically targeted to vulnerable building types with consequential attributes, including service type, number of occupants, floor area and geographic location.

ACPD was able to rapidly cull down its portfolio of approximately 3,500 buildings to just over 100 “high-exposure” buildings in urgent need of evaluation, set priorities for future evaluations, estimate needed operational and capital expenditures for long-term planning and provide useful information to more general facilities management decision-making processes.

A number of major cities around the world in areas of high seismicity have enacted ordinances mandating seismic retrofitting. However, much of the existing guiding literature regarding earthquake-related portfolio evaluations and costs pertains to specific scenarios involving real or hypothetical earthquakes. This case study, in contrast, details the approach taken by a public portfolio owner responding to legal mandates and attempting to quantify and reduce its life-safety risk exposure across a large portfolio as efficiently as possible using readily available information, a rapid building evaluation programme and best-practice predictive models for consulting and construction work.

The purpose of this paper is to examine why building owners are often reluctant to adopt adequate mitigation measures despite the vulnerability of their buildings to earthquake disasters, by exploring the economic-related barriers to earthquake mitigation decisions.

A case study research method was adopted and interviews chosen as the method of data collection.

Critical economic-related impediments that inhibited seismic retrofitting of earthquake-prone buildings were revealed in this study. Economic-related barriers identified include perception about financial involvement in retrofitting, property market conditions, high insurance premiums and deductibles, and the high cost of retrofitting. The availability of financial incentives such as low interest loans, tax deductibles, the implementation of a risk-based insurance premium scale and promoting increased knowledge and awareness of seismic risks and mitigation measures in the property market place are likely to address the economic-related challenges faced by property owners when undertaking seismic retrofitting projects. The provision of financial incentives specifically for seismic retrofitting should be introduced in policy-implementation programme tailored to local governments’ level of risks exposure and available resources.

The recommendations provided in this study suggest strategies and answers to questions aimed at understanding the types of incentives that city councils and environmental hazard managers should focus on in their attempt to ensure that property owners actively participate in earthquake risk mitigation.

This paper adopts a holistic perspective for investigating earthquake risk mitigation by examining the opinions of the different stakeholders involved in seismic retrofit decisions.

Currently trending as a practical approach to promote urban and seismic resilience, the adaptive reuse of historical buildings relies on expertise from various professional backgrounds ranging from conservation, urban planning, construction management, architecture, engineering to interior design. This paper explores the applicability of a performance-based multiple criteria decision assessment (MCDA) framework to prioritise underutilised historical buildings for adaptive reuse in Auckland, New Zealand while balancing the diverse interest of all relevant stakeholders.

A focus group workshop was conducted for relevant adaptive stakeholders in Auckland, New Zealand, to test the applicability of the performance-based MCDA framework developed by Aigwi et al. (2020) and prioritise four underutilised historical building alternatives for adaptive reuse interventions in Auckland, New Zealand.

Findings from this study revealed the significant potentials of the performance-based MCDA framework, both as an evidence-based measurement tool to prioritise underutilised earthquake-prone historical buildings in Auckland's central business district and as an effective decision-making strategy. Also, the framework allowed the inclusion of diverse stakeholders through the integration of collaborative rationality, ensuring consistency and transparency in the decision-making process.

The successful validation of the existing performance-based MCDA framework in Auckland, New Zealand, using multiple historical building alternatives, further strengthens its preceding validation by Aigwi et al. (2019) using only two historical buildings in Whanganui, New Zealand. The findings provide a theoretical platform for urban planning researchers to advance performance-based planning for adaptive reuse to other locations and fields. There are also interesting implications for local councils, heritage agencies, architects, urban planners, policymakers, building owners and developers in Auckland, New Zealand, as a guide to improving their understandings of: (1) the intangible values of optimal historical buildings perceived by the community as worthy of protection through adaptive reuse; and (2) the targeted needs of communities in the new functions of an optimal alternative from a group of representative historical building alternatives.

New Zealand building code may be serving its purpose to an extent, there is still a need to develop a framework to improve the use and application of building code for better building performance and services. This study aims to validate the identified parameters in the developed framework to improve building code practice in New Zealand.

Subject matter experts interview was conducted with key stakeholders that use building code, standards and other associated compliance documents.

The findings from this study establish the importance of improving the building code, and the efficacy of validated framework helps to identify the areas with the most pressing needs within the building regulatory system. All the subject matter experts unanimously agreed on educating and training the building code users. Besides, the validated framework will enable the policy decision-makers in the building regulatory system to promote the use of building code and the utilisation of its potentials in reducing disaster while increasing the built environment resilience. The study concludes that the designed framework will create more robust strategy implementations to enhance innovative solutions embedded in performance-based building code.

This study originality centres on the practical application of an evidence-based framework for performance-based building code, standards and other related compliance documents.

Most provincial town centres in New Zealand typically feature old and vacant historical buildings, the majority of which possess heritage values. The growing perception that it is cheaper to repurpose vacant historical buildings rather than demolishing and rebuilding them is one of the factors that have made the adaptive reuse approach so popular. However, will this also be the case for provincial town centres in New Zealand? The purpose of this paper is to identify and explore the key factors that could influence the efficacy of adaptive reuse, and check for significant differences in the effect that each perceived factor would have on the adaptive reuse efficacy as a justifiable resilient and sustainable approach towards the regeneration of a major provincial town centre in New Zealand that is currently experiencing inner-city shrinkage.

A focus group workshop was conducted with 22 stakeholders involved in an existing town centre regeneration agenda for Whanganui. Closed-ended questionnaires were administered to the workshop participants to measure their opinions regarding the efficacy of the adaptive reuse approach for the regeneration of Whanganui’s town centre. The participant mix comprised a combination of structural engineers, quantity surveyors, architects, estate valuers, building owners/developers, legal representatives, heritage representatives and local government council representatives.

The study reported a high proportion of respondents that strongly agreed to the positive impacts of adaptive reuse with regards to the discussed priority aspects, hence, justifying the efficacy of the approach, towards delivering a vibrant town centre for Whanganui. Also, the Friedman’s analysis suggests that no significant differences existed among all perceived adaptive reuse efficacy criteria by the workshop participants, therefore justifying the approach.

This paper’s originality pertains to the practicality of changing the use of vacant historical buildings in Whanganui, which is one of New Zealand’s major provincial town centres, to renegotiate resilience and sustainable urban regeneration for the area.

The New Zealand building code has played a vital role in reducing the impact of disasters in the built environment. Following the nature of earthquake occurrences, the associated impacts such as building collapse and the increase in technological innovation in the building sector, the New Zealand building code has been frequently amended. The building code amendment ensures that buildings and other related infrastructures can withstand the impact of ground shaking without substantial damages to buildings. The purpose of this paper is to identify and explore the benefits of building code amendments in New Zealand.

Document analysis and closed-ended questionnaire were adopted as data collection instruments for this study. The relevant stakeholders comprise structural engineer, geotechnical engineer, architect, building services consulting engineer, licensed building practitioner, project manager, building contractor, local authority, academic/researcher and quantity surveyor.

A significant proportion of the survey participants that agreed to the importance of building code amendments in New Zealand justify the benefits of the amendments. The study serves as a useful guide to policy regulators and researchers who are exploring other aspects of regular building code amendments in New Zealand. The findings from this study suggest that amending the New Zealand building code needs a proactive approach to promote local technology, enhance low-cost construction materials, training of code users and reducing bureaucracy in design approval and construction inspection. The study concludes that improving on the 28 factors identified in this study would contribute intensively to disaster risk reduction in the built environment and an increase in compliance level in New Zealand.

This paper originality comes from its practical approach towards identifying the benefits of building code amendments

The process followed in amending building code creates problems for code users within the building industry. These problems include the need and frequency of changes made to building code, access to updated documents, method of communication, amendment interval and amendment pathway. This study aims to explore the viewpoints of building code users regarding building code amendments in New Zealand.

Using a closed-ended questionnaire survey, this paper examined the New Zealand building code amendments by evaluating the views of experienced and relevant stakeholders within the research area.

A high proportion (50.90%) of the survey participants agreed to a three-years building code amendment cycle, as against the current biannual Amendment practiced in New Zealand. Findings from the study affirmed the necessity for building code amendment and the support for free amended building code documents to the public and other building standards. The study concludes with strong support to the use of intensive research and learning gained from disasters in building code amendment in New Zealand. Implementing the code users opinions encourages disaster resilience through effective application of the building code requirements in design and construction.

The contribution from this study offered a unique insight into the perspectives of building code users on building code amendment in New Zealand and ways of incorporating the findings in the building code later updates to improve disaster resilience in the built environment.

This paper aims to investigate residents’ perceptions of risk towards owning and living in residential property in Christchurch subsequent to the 2010 and 2011 Canterbury earthquakes to identify how these perceptions impact on the price residents are willing to pay for affected property. Such market behaviour can motivate homeowners to adopt risk mitigation measures.

An online survey was developed and the Web link distributed to Canterbury residents via the media. This method of distribution was adopted, as a postal survey was not possible due to the number of homes that had been destroyed by the earthquakes and the highly transient nature of the community as a result.

The results indicate that with the recent earthquake experience, residents are demonstrating risk mitigation behaviours through an aversion to investing in properties affected by, or with a risk of, liquefaction. Specifically, the majority of respondents had strong reservations about buying Technical Category 3 property, and would be prepared to pay 20 per cent (or > 20 per cent) less for it, indicating some stigma towards affected property. Further, most respondents would now prefer the construction of their home to be of a type that fared better in the earthquakes: lightweight, single-storey, with a concrete slab foundation. These housing preferences will likely drive the market towards the adoption of risk mitigation measures in the retrofit of existing homes as well as in the design and construction of new homes.

Due to the number of homes that had been destroyed by the earthquakes and the highly transient nature of the community as a result, probability sampling was not possible. This, together with the low response rate, means that the respondents surveyed may not be representative of the Christchurch population.

The outcomes of this research will be of interest not only to homeowners wanting to know how their home’s value has been impacted by market perceptions towards earthquake and liquefaction damage, particularly in the worst-affected areas, but also the rating valuers tasked with assessing property values for rating purposes. Property developers and builders involved in the repair of existing homes and construction of new homes will also want to know current market preferences. Government bodies will find the results informative of how the media has, and can be used, to motivate market behaviour towards risk mitigation, particularly in regard to “material risk” (as described in Solberg et al., 2010), that is risk from a scientific and technical viewpoint of probability of future risk, and as related to what has become known about these risks in terms of building structure, height, age, soil type/land categories and flood zones. Further, the results provide a gauge of how the community perceived the handling of the recovery process, so that the weaknesses highlighted can be addressed, which will help restore community trust.

This study fills a research void on the impact of residents’ perceptions of risk towards home ownership in a city impacted by significant earthquakes and resulting liquefaction.