North Canterbury earthquake

I felt it lying in bed in Auckland.

I live in the loft of a less-than-ideal work building here in Greymouth. Made my way outside; first time I've done that, as I was concerned about the structural integrity of this building. Personally, I don't subscribe to the general thinking of getting under furniture/in doorways etc. I understand the reasoning, and certainly don't question anyone's decision to do so (had me grinning River), but I want to, as best I can, see what's happening, giving me an increased ability to react. At the end of the day, I wasn't too worried; my car has always got everything I need in it if evac is required. If it all turns to the brown stuff I can comfortably live out of my car for at least a month, with food, water, shelter etc all packed. When the sustained shake kicked in, I was watching Survivor. Had a chuckle about that. :) Came back inside, cracked open a Jimmy, continued watching Survivor while riding out the aftershocks and perusing reactions online, before going back to sleep. I have my exit strategies in place. Unless I get crushed initially, I'm all good. I do, of course, feel for those who have families and property to protect and worry about.

Government needs to get Civil Defence organised. If the Alpine Fault goes during tourist season, Heaven help us !. https://resources.stuff.co.nz/content/dam/images/1/f/h/c/w/b/image.related.StuffLandscapeSixteenByNine.620x349.1fhpv6.png/1479175242983.jpg https://resources.stuff.co.nz/content/dam/images/1/f/h/h/q/r/image.related.StuffLandscapeSixteenByNine.620x349.1fhjrt.png/1479168590966.jpg "Tourists trapped by the Kaikoura earthquake arrive by military helicopters at Woodend School grounds in Christchurch."

Now things are coming under control even though still far from normal I have to ask. Was anyone doing a moonlight Sawcut Gorge on Sunday night?

By all means, if anybody was out and about around the time, please chip in, but this event has logistics ramifications - ""The railway has been destroyed along the coast, and the fix will not occur until after the road has been repaired. Repairing the road will be the fastest way of repairing the rail, and access for heavy machinery will be by road, as it is cleared."" ""The amount of traffic will increase way above normal levels. SH1 used to carry 3000-4000 trucks per day along the Kaikoura Coast. This will have to transfer to the much longer Lewis Pass route if Christchurch and Dunedin, Queenstown, Invercargill and all of the surrounding towns are to be supplied at the levels that they expect. There will be inevitable delays. First from the additional distance required to be travelled. Previously the trip from Picton to Christchurch was about 330km, and 5½ hours by truck. It was an easy return day trip. The longer Lewis Pass route is about 580km (75% longer in distance) and will take about 10 ½ hours by truck. This will effectively double the time it takes to move freight, and require additional vehicles to meet the demand. This at a time when, approaching Christmas, there is not much additional capacity available. This will mean stuff doesn’t get through. The even longer Arthur’s Pass route is around 600km (similar to Auckland to Wellington), but around 11 ½ hours truck travel time. For North Island people the change is like going from Auckland to Turangi and back, compared to Auckland to Wellington and back. This is a very different situation to the Christchurch earthquakes. There the demand for goods increased, but the transport network remained a reliable constant. In this case the demand for goods will not increase significantly, given the different nature of the bulk of the damage. In this case, the network to deliver the goods has been severely damages, and the reliability, and dependability has been seriously altered. The network and transport industry will struggle in a way that will make South Island supply quite uncomfortable until the SH1 is opened to normal traffic. Realistically that will take months, if not years to return to normal. Odd side benefits will be the extra accommodation and meal requirements for travellers and transport operators travelling through areas not so frequently travelled. Jill’s Café in Outer Nowhere will become very busy, and so will hundreds of other cafes and motels. A (return) truck trip to Picton will now take two days from Christchurch. That effectively means that double the number of drivers and trucks will be required to shift the same amount of goods. That resource does not exist, so supplies will be reduced. Higher Productivity trucks will assist this, but the road through SH7 is a lot slower, and lot more challenging for a driver. This will, and I stress will, lead to delays. It will also lead to increased cost of transport, and increased pressure on the already damaged infrastructure. The challenge will be in how customers, suppliers and consumers react to these additional costs and pressures"".

Medium term where freight is concerned, is there a potential role here for increased coastal shipping? (The dynamics of volume and speed are all different, of course.) I heard someone suggest this morning that it might be worth re-starting the ferry route between Wellington and Lyttelton, although I'd expect it'd take a while to get the facilities up and running for that, and might be very expensive depending on what's wanted. Probably longer than the road. (Plus, Wellington tends to have its own access problems during certain types of emergencies.)

There is a fully operational port at Lyttelton, I can't see why there has to be a shortage of goods unless moving them by ship is just too expensive?

its just a matter of all the logistics companies working together to direct their freight onto ships, it just may not be as economical with rival companies doing different things and shipping via land....

So... where are the prospective alternative routes if SH1 is deemed to be too trashed to rely on in future? Is any conservation land potentially likely to be lined up for road and/or rail? I see on Wikipedia's rail network maps, there are some proposed (but never built) rail links that go inland near St Arnaud.

"We have to ask ourselves if the existing SH1 is in the best place". State highway 1 through Molesworth anyone?