KGA Geotechnical Group Ltd

The Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetu is a landmark building for Christchurch and was used as the Civil Defence Headquarters following the 2010 to 2011 earthquakes. However, the structure suffered severe differential settlement during the earthquakes and considerable relevelling was required to return the building to pre-earthquake integrity.

A combination of ground strengthening with jet grout columns, grout injection techniques and compaction grouting were required to reinstate the concrete slab of the gallery to the pre-earthquake levels.

KGA initially provided preliminary design of the relevelling solution, including extensive geotechnical ground investigation to determine the precise 'lay of the land'. The relevelling programme was undertaken by KGA, working in conjunction with our partner, Jet SJ Geotecnia of Lisbon, Portugal. JetSJ provided detailed numerical modelling input to the design using FEM analysis and the gallery was reopened to great fanfare in December 2015.

The project was award the International Project of the Year Award at the 2016 Ground Engineering Awards.

For a video about the Art Gallery relevelling, click here.