Erskine College gets a orange sticker

Erskine College gets an orange sticker – red one on the way

Tuesday, March 27th, 2012

Island Bay’s Erskine College has been orange stickered by the Wellington City Council and could face demolition.

Erskine College was a Catholic Girls School which closed down in the 1980s. It was used by an Art School until Feb 2009. The chapel continues to be used for weddings.

An orange sticker means that a building is earthquake -prone, that is, it is likely to collapse, causing injury or death, in a moderate earthquake.

Once a building is classified as earthquake-prone, the building owner may choose to strengthen it, or if appropriate, demolish all or part of the building.

With restoration costs likely to be millions of dollars, property manager for The Wellington Company, Murray Anderson, said the council would have to go ahead with red-stickering the century old property.

Red stickers indicate a building is unsafe for people to occupy.

Erskine is protected by a heritage order. Any work to be carried out would need the written consent of its heritage protection authority, the Save Erskine College Trust.

Save Erskine College Trust was established in 1992 as the result of a public meeting held in Island Bay. It was recognised as a Heritage Protection Authority under Section 188 of the Resource Management Act (1991).

The purpose of the Save Erskine College Trust is: To save Erskine College its grounds and its chapel as a significant and historic part of the Island Bay community; and To secure, promote and further the use of Erskine College for study, training, education, research, practice, and performance of or pertaining to the arts and culture and as a community asset and amenity.

Trust secretary Maggie Kennedy said they had not been notified by the council of the impending red stickering, which raised concerns about what The Wellington Company had planned for the site.

“We’re concerned they want to demolish the main building to put cheek by jowl townhouses right under the chin of the chapel, which would completely crowd it out”, she said.