A five-year $2 billion rebuild plan of Christchurch's earthquake-damaged infrastructure has been unveiled today.
The city's underground pipe network and its roads were badly damaged in the intense shaking over the last two years.
Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee and city mayor Bob Parker today revealed the plan, which will aim to fix the worst affected areas, such as the eastern suburbs, first.
The plan includes a map setting out timeframes for roads and underground services across the city.
"This work is one piece of a much bigger and complex city-wide recovery programme," Mr Brownlee said.
"But it is highly significant as underground services need to be rebuilt and future-proofed so that the city's recovery is founded on a secure infrastructure base."
He described the numbers involved as "astronomical", with 1000km of roads to be done, hundreds of kilometres of water, waste and storm water networks to be addressed, along with 45 footbridges and 18 roadbridges.
Mr Brownlee said the results wouldn't be visible, but were vitally important in Christchurch becoming the best small city in the world.
Mayor Parker said the plan gave "certainty for the future".
It builds on the "good progress" on the rebuild work of the last 12 months, he said.
"Already, we've completed 187 projects worth $73 million including: rebuilding 39km of wastewater pipe - that's about the distance from central Christchurch to Dunsandel - and laying 92,000 square metres, or 13 rugby fields, of road pavement."
SCIRT, the Stronger Christchurch Infrastructure Rebuild Team, is the partnership formed to deliver the infrastructure rebuild, which will be funded by the Government and Christchurch City Council.
The schedule of works released today will be reviewed quarterly and updated as SCIRT teams learn more about what is required and respond to information from on-going investigations.
Chairman of SCIRT, Mark Ford, said the rebuild was a huge task likely to cost more than $2.2bn. Around $1.1bn in funding has already been committed.
Mr Ford said "we'll do everything" to minimise disruption for residents, but added that roadworks was a positive sign as "it means progress".
Up to 150 SCIRT worksites will be active as the rebuild of infrastructure hits its peak in coming months.
Information about the programme of works can be found online at www.strongerchristchurch.govt.nz.
