Christchurch Ōtautahi (Māori)
City
Christchurch Central City (2020) Banks Peninsula and Akaroa Harbour Bridge of Remembrance Hagley Park Sumner and Southshore Christchurch Art Gallery
Flag Coat of arms
Nickname:  The Garden City
Motto(s):  Fide Condita Fructu Beata Spe Fortis English: Founded in Faith, Rich in the Fulfillment thereof, Strong in Hope for the Future[1]
Christchurch Show map of South Island Christchurch Show map of New Zealand
Coordinates: 43°32′S 172°37′E / 43.533°S 172.617°E / -43.533; 172.617
Country	New Zealand
Island	South Island
Region	Canterbury
Communities	Banks Peninsula Coastal-Burwood Fendalton-Waimairi-Harewood Halswell-Hornby-Riccarton Linwood-Central-Heathcote Papanui-Innes Spreydon-Cashmere
Wards	Banks Peninsula Burwood Cashmere Central Coastal Fendalton Halswell Harewood Heathcote Hornby Innes Linwood Papanui Riccarton Spreydon Waimairi
Settled by the UK	1848
Named for	Christ Church, Oxford
NZ Parliament	Banks Peninsula Christchurch Central Christchurch East Ilam Selwyn Waimakariri Wigram Te Tai Tonga (Māori)
Government
• Mayor	Phil Mauger
• MPs	Matt Doocey (National) Nicola Grigg (National) Vanessa Weenink (National) Hamish Campbell (National) Tākuta Ferris (Te Pāti Māori) Duncan Webb (Labour) Reuben Davidson (Labour) Megan Woods (Labour)
• Territorial authority	Christchurch City Council
Area [2]
• Territorial	1,426 km2 (551 sq mi)
• Land	1,415.47 km2 (546.52 sq mi)
• Urban	295.15 km2 (113.96 sq mi)
• Metro	2,408.1 km2 (929.8 sq mi)
Elevation [3]	20 m (70 ft)
Population  (June 2023)[4]
• Territorial	396,200
• Density	280/km2 (720/sq mi)
• Urban	384,800
• Urban density	1,300/km2 (3,400/sq mi)
• Metro	521,881
• Metro density	220/km2 (560/sq mi)
• Demonym	Cantabrian
Time zone	UTC+12:00 (NZST)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+13:00 (NZDT)
Postcode(s)	8011, 8013, 8014, 8022, 8023, 8024, 8025, 8041, 8042, 8051, 8052, 8053, 8061, 8062, 8081, 8082,
Area code	03
Local iwi	Kāti Māmoe, Ngāi Tahu
Website	ChristchurchNZ.com

Christchurch (/ˈkraɪstʃɜːrtʃ/ ^ⓘ; Māori: Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island and the second-largest city by urban area population in New Zealand, after Auckland.^[a] Christchurch lies in the Canterbury Region, near the centre of the east coast of the South Island, east of the Canterbury Plains. It is located near the southern end of Pegasus Bay, and is bounded to the east by the Pacific Ocean and to the south by Banks Peninsula. The Avon River / Ōtākaro flows through the centre of the city, with a large urban park along its banks. Christchurch has a reputation for being an 'English' city, with its architectural identity and common nickname the "Garden City" due to similarities with garden cities in England.

The city's territorial authority population is 396,200 people, and includes a number of smaller urban areas as well as rural areas.^[4] Notable satellite towns within the Greater Christchurch sub-region include Rangiora and Kaiapoi in Waimakariri District, north of the Waimakariri River, and Rolleston and Lincoln in Selwyn District to the south. Christchurch is served by the Christchurch Airport in Harewood, the country's second-busiest airport.

The area of modern-day greater Christchurch was originally swampland with patchworks of marshland. Evidence of human activity in the area goes as far back as 1250 AD with evidence of prolonged occupation by prehistoric Māori people beginning no later than 1350. The area of Christchurch was an important foraging ground and a seasonal settlement for local iwi and hapū before the arrival of Europeans. Christchurch was established as a British colonial settlement in the mid-nineteenth century. The First Four Ships were chartered by the Canterbury Association and brought the first 792 of the Canterbury Pilgrims from Britain to Lyttelton Harbour in 1850. It became a city by royal charter on 31 July 1856, making it officially the oldest established city in New Zealand. Later, industrialisation and the opening of the Main South Line railway and the connection to Lyttelton Harbour by the Lyttelton Rail Tunnel saw rapid growth in the city's economy and population, with large industrial premises built along the railway. The city has been recognised as an Antarctic gateway since 1901, when the Discovery Expedition left from Lyttelton Harbour, and is nowadays one of the five Antarctic gateway cities hosting Antarctic support bases for several nations. Christchurch hosted the 1974 British Commonwealth Games at the purpose-built Queen Elizabeth II Park. The early presence of the University of Canterbury and the heritage of the city's academic institutions in association with local businesses has fostered a number of technology-based industries.

The city suffered a series of earthquakes from September 2010, with the most destructive occurring on 22 February 2011, in which 185 people were killed and thousands of buildings across the city suffered severe damage, with a few central city buildings collapsing, leading to ongoing recovery and rebuilding projects. The city later became the site of a terrorist attack targeting two mosques on 15 March 2019.

Toponymy

The name Christchurch was adopted at the first meeting of the Canterbury Association on 27 March 1848. The reason it was chosen is not known with certainty, but the most likely reason is it was named after Christ Church, Oxford, the alma mater of many members of the association, including John Robert Godley.^[7] Christ Church college had similarities with the planned new city, including its own cathedral, the smallest in England.^[8] Other possibilities are that it was named for Christchurch, Dorset, or for Canterbury Cathedral. Many of the early colonists did not like the name, preferring instead the name Lyttelton, but the Colonists' Council resolved to stick with the name of Christchurch in 1851, because it had been used by surveyors and distinguished the settlement from the port.^[9]

The Māori name Ōtautahi, meaning 'the place of Tautahi', was adopted in the 1930s. Ōtautahi was the name of a specific site by the Avon River / Ōtākaro (near the present-day fire-station on Kilmore Street).^[10][11] The site was a seasonal food-gathering place of Ngāi Tahu chief Te Pōtiki Tautahi. Although, a different account claims the Tautahi in question was the son of the Port Levy chief Huikai.^[12][13] Prior to that, Ngāi Tahu generally referred to the Christchurch area as Karaitiana, an anglicised version.^[14][15][16]

"ChCh" is commonly used as an abbreviation of Christchurch.^[17][18][19]

In New Zealand Sign Language, Christchurch is signed with two Cs.^[20]

History

Early settlement

The area of modern-day greater Christchurch was originally swampland with patchworks of marshland, grassland, scrub and some patches of tall forest. Evidence of human activity in the area goes as far back as 1250 AD,^[21] with evidence of prolonged occupation beginning no later than 1350 AD.^[22] These people in the pre-historic Māori period are believed to have been moa-hunters, who occupied coastal caves around modern-day Sumner.^[23][24] These early settlers and their descendants are known from Ngāi Tahu tradition as the Waitaha iwi.^[25] Around c. 1500 the Kāti Māmoe tribe migrated south from the east coast of the North Island, and gained control of much of Canterbury.^[25] They were later joined by Ngāi Tahu beginning in c. 1600,^[25] who ultimately absorbed both the Waitaha and Kāti Māmoe through a mixture of conflict and marriage.^[25][26]

European settlement began in the mid nineteenth century. The first Europeans to be established in the area were the brothers William and John Deans, who established a farm at Riccarton. Their farm took over the abandoned holdings of a previous failed pioneer farm. In 1848 the New Zealand Company acquired the land of Canterbury from Ngāi Tahu with the signing of Kemp's Deed, and within a few years the Canterbury Association had begun surveying and planning to establish the city of Christchurch. The First Four Ships were chartered by the Canterbury Association and brought the first 792 of the Canterbury Pilgrims to Lyttelton Harbour in 1850.^[b] The early settlers set about draining the swampy ground, and over the following decades they established Christchurch as a British colonial outpost.

Recent events

On Saturday, 4 September 2010, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck Christchurch and the central Canterbury region at 4:35 am. With its epicentre near Darfield, west of the city at a depth of 10 kilometres (6.2 mi), it caused widespread damage to the city and minor injuries, but no direct fatalities.^[29][30]

Nearly six months later, on Tuesday 22 February 2011, a second earthquake measuring magnitude 6.3 struck the city at 12:51 pm. Its epicentre was located closer to the city, near Lyttelton, at a depth of 5 km (3 mi).^[31] Although lower on the moment magnitude scale than the previous earthquake, the intensity and violence of the ground shaking was measured to be IX (Violent), among the strongest ever recorded globally in an urban area, which killed 185 people.^[32][33][34]

On 13 February 2017, two bush fires started on the Port Hills. These merged over the next two days and the single very large wildfire extended down both sides of the Port Hill almost reaching Governors Bay in the south-west, and the Westmorland, Kennedys Bush, and Dyers Pass Road almost down to the Sign of the Takahe. Eleven houses were destroyed by fire, over one thousand residents were evacuated from their homes, and over 2,076 hectares (5,130 acres) of land was burned.^[35]

Fifty-one people died from two consecutive mass shootings at Al Noor Mosque and Linwood Islamic Centre by an Australian white supremacist carried out on 15 March 2019.^{[36][37][38][39][40]} Forty others were injured.^[41] The attacks have been described by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern as "one of New Zealand's darkest days".^[42] On 2 June 2020, the attacker pleaded guilty to multiple charges of murder, attempted murder, and terrorism.^[43][44] On 27 August, he was sentenced to life in prison without parole, the first time such a sentence was handed down in New Zealand.^[45][46][47]

In 2024, a second fire on the Port Hills burned 700 hectares (1,700 acres) of the hills in a similar area to the previous 2017 fire. The fire was also started under similarly suspicious circumstances. Lessons from the 2017 fire contributed to a more effective emergency response, and the fire was more-quickly contained.

Geography

Setting

Christchurch lies in Canterbury, near the centre of the east coast of the South Island, east of the Canterbury Plains. It is located near the southern end of Pegasus Bay, and is bounded to the east by the Pacific Ocean coast and the estuary of the Avon / Ōtākaro and Ōpāwaho / Heathcote Rivers. To the south and south-east, the urban portion of the city is limited by the volcanic slopes of the Port Hills separating it from Banks Peninsula. To the north, the city is bounded by the braided Waimakariri River.

Geology

The present land mass of New Zealand split from the super continent of Gondwana around 85 million years ago. Prior to that time, mudstone and hardened sandstones commonly known as greywacke was deposited and deformed by tectonic movement. Following the split from Gondwana, during the period between 80 and 23 million years ago, the land became eroded and subsided below sea level. Marine and terrestrial sediments were deposited, leaving the greywacke as the oldest and deepest layers (basement rock). Around 11–6 million years ago, volcanic eruptions created the Banks Peninsula volcanic complex. Over the last two million years as the Southern Alps were rising, there were multiple periods of glaciation. River flowing from the mountains carried alluvial gravels over area that is now the Canterbury Plains, covering the underlying rock to depths of between 200 and 600 metres. Continuing tectonic movement created faults that penetrate from the greywacke rock into the layers above. These faults remain beneath Canterbury and Christchurch.^[48]: 21

The glacial/interglacial cycles of the Quaternary Period led to multiple rises and falls in sea level. These sea level changes occurred over a period when there was also slow subsidence in the eastern coastal plains of Canterbury and Christchurch. The result has been the deposition of sequences of mostly fluvial gravel (occurring during periods of low sea level and glaciation), and fine deposits of silt, sand and clay, with some peat, shells and wood (occurring during interglacial periods when the sea level was similar to the present).^[49]: 13

Aquifer and spring-fed streams

The layers of gravel beneath the eastern Canterbury plains and Christchurch area form an artesian aquifer with the interbedded fine sediments as an impermeable layer, or aquiclude. Water pressure from the artesian aquifer has led to the formation of numerous spring-fed streams. In Christchurch, the Avon River / Ōtākaro and Ōpāwaho / Heathcote River rivers have spring-fed sources in the western suburbs of Christchurch, and the Halswell River begins north-west of the Port Hills on the periphery of Christchurch and flows to Lake Ellesmere / Te Waihora).^[49]: 14

As a consequence of the flat terrain and spring-fed streams, large parts of the area now occupied by Christchurch City were originally a coastal wetland, with extensive swamp forests. Much of the forest was destroyed by fire, mostly likely by the earliest inhabitants, from around 1000 CE. When European settlers arrived in the 19th century, the area was a mixture of swamp and tussock grasslands, with only remnant patches of forest. An early European visitor was William Barnard Rhodes, captain of the barque Australian, who climbed the Port Hills from Lyttelton Harbour in September 1836 and observed a large grassy plain with two small areas of forest. He reported that "All the land that I saw was swamp and mostly covered with water".^[50] Most of the eastern, southern and northern parts of the city were wet areas when European settlement began.^[51]

Over the period since European settlement commenced, land drainage works have enabled development of land across the city. There are now only small remnants of wetland remaining, such as Riccarton Bush, Travis Wetland, Ōtukaikino wetland, and the Cashmere Valley.^[52]

Central City

Christchurch Central City is defined as the area centred on Cathedral Square and within the Four Avenues (Bealey Avenue, Fitzgerald Avenue, Moorhouse Avenue and Deans Avenue).^[53] It includes Hagley Park, and the Christchurch Botanic Gardens. The design of the central city with its grid pattern of streets, city squares and parkland was laid out by 1850.^[54]

The central city was among the most heavily damaged areas of Christchurch in the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes.^[55] Following the second earthquake, the Central City Red Zone was set up as an exclusion zone for public safety reasons, and many parts remained closed to the public until June 2013.^[56] A large number of heritage buildings were demolished following the earthquake, along with most of the city's high rise buildings.^[57][58] The Christchurch Central Recovery Plan was developed to lead the rebuild of the city centre, and featured 17 "anchor projects".^[59][60] There has been massive growth in the residential sector in the central city, particulary in the East Frame development.^[61]

Suburbs

Christchurch suburbs
2km 1.2miles    Click on the top right box to expand to see suburbs

There is no legal definition of the boundaries of suburbs in Christchurch.^[62] For the purposes of postal deliveries, postal area codes were introduced in 1981, and the name of the suburb is not required.^[63]

The earliest suburbs of Christchurch were laid out with streets in a grid pattern, centred on Cathedral Square. Growth initially took place along the tramlines, leading to radial development.^[64] Major expansion occurred in the 1950s and 60s, with the development of large areas of state housing. Settlements that had originally been remote, such as Sumner, New Brighton, Upper Riccarton and Papanui eventually became amalgamated into the expanding city.^[65]

Satellite towns

The Christchurch functional urban area, as defined by Statistics New Zealand, covers 2,408.1 km² (929.8 sq mi).^[66] Towns and settlements in the functional urban area include:

Climate

Christchurch has a temperate oceanic climate (Köppen: Cfb) with a mild summer, cool winter, and regular moderate rainfall. It has mean daily maximum air temperatures of 22.6 °C (73 °F) in January and 10.9 °C (52 °F) in July.^[67] Summer in the city is mostly warm, but is often moderated by a sea breeze from the north-east. A record high temperature of 41.6 °C (106.9 °F) was reached in February 1973. A notable feature of the weather is the nor'wester, a hot föhn wind that occasionally reaches storm force, causing widespread minor damage to property.^[68] Like many cities, Christchurch experiences an urban heat island effect; temperatures are slightly higher within the inner-city regions compared to the surrounding countryside.^[69]

In winter, it is common for the temperature to fall below 0 °C (32 °F) at night. There are on average 80 days of ground frost per year.^[70] Snowfall occurs on average three times per year, although in some years none is recorded.^[71] The lowest temperature recorded was −7.1 °C (19.2 °F) on 18 July 1945, the third-lowest recorded temperature of New Zealand's major cities.^[71][72]

On cold winter nights, the surrounding hills, clear skies, and frosty calm conditions often combine to form a stable inversion layer above the city that traps vehicle exhausts and smoke from domestic fires to cause smog.^[73] While not as bad as smog in Los Angeles or Mexico City, Christchurch smog has often exceeded World Health Organisation recommendations for air pollution. To limit air pollution, the regional council banned the use of open fires in the city in 2006.^[74]