Wellington Council uncertain on St James Theatre's earthquake restrengthening deadline
St James Theatre Courtenay Place, Wellington, New Zealand.
It's a race against time to earthquake strengthen Wellington's St James Theatre.
Wellington City Council projected that the $13 million works on the capital's historical theatre would take one year, with a completion date in September 2019. Now, that date is uncertain.
Spokesman Richard MacLean said council would have a greater understanding on final timings, costs and other issues within the next eight weeks as council contractors worked through the scope of works.
The Opera House wasn't up to scratch for the NZ OPera.
"As such, it's still slightly too early to make a call on the expected completion date," he said.
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* Earthquake strengthening set to close Wellington's St James Theatre for a year
* Royal New Zealand Ballet to get temporary home in a central Wellington car park
* Wellington City Council to spend $2.6m on St James Theatre and $3.8m for NZ ballet's temporary home at national dance centre
* Wellington's St James Theatre declared earthquake prone
But it couldn't be delayed for too much longer. Mayor Justin Lester said works needed to be completed by the 2020 New Zealand Festival which runs for two weeks at the end of February.
Building of the temporary venue for the Royal New Zealand Ballet is expected to start in the first week of July.
A spokesperson for the Festival said they had not been informed of the deadline being at risk.
"The impact of such a delay would clearly be significant for the Festival, particularly with the ongoing closure of the Town Hall, so alternative venue solutions would be worked through in partnership with Council," the spokesperson said in a statement.
Meanwhile, long-term tenants of the St James Theatre have been forced to make sacrifices, as they temporarily perform at the nearby Opera House.
Speaking at Wellington City Council's grants subcommittee, NZ Opera executive director Richard Knowles said NZ Opera would revise its commitment to the capital following a lack of funding from council and an "inferior" venue.
"We can't risk not having a venue to perform in and have therefore planned our second season next year to be again at the Opera House," he said.
"Performing at the Opera House seriously compromises some of our production standards as well as the revenue opportunities that we're able to generate there.
"The stage is considerably smaller than anywhere else we perform, so productions we bring to Wellington have to be altered somewhat unreasonably in some cases to perform on a smaller stage."
For two productions in Wellington this year, the NZ Opera would spend approximately $1.8 million, with a deficit of $800,000.
Meanwhile, the capital's ballet dancers were still awaiting their new venue at the Michael Fowler carpark site.
Building of the temporary venue is expected to commence in the first week of July.
A RNZB spokesperson said over the next six months the ballet would invest just over $150,000 in venue hire and crew costs at the Opera House. Next year, the ballet forecasted $320,000 (which included a 20 per cent discount on venue hire from the Wellington Regional Economic Development Agency) for venue hire and staffing for four productions. Live music spend was projected to be around $120,000.
Lost opportunity cost the ballet around $67,000 this year. Next year they were projecting that loss to reach $90,000.
"While our 2019 budget is still coming into land, we have still got our seatbelts on for that one," the spokesperson said.
"We love being here but as you can see we have a great need for support from many places, including from council."
- Stuff
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