Wellington Expertise On Show In San Francisco20 April 2006
WEDNESDAY APRIL 19, 2006
Wellington Expertise On Show AtSan Francisco Earthquake Centenary
Several of Wellington sleading earthquake engineers and scientists presented todayat the 100th Anniversary Earthquake Conference, in SanFrancisco.
The Conference, which has attracted 2,000attendees from the United States, New Zealand, and aroundthe world, has enabled earthquake professionals to sharetheir ideas and establish new connections. It marks exactly100 years since the San Francisco earthquake of 1906.
"I mproud to be here with leading Wellington-based companies andorganisations such as Beca Carter and GNS Science," saidPositively Wellington Business (PWB) CEO Philip Lewin todayfrom San Francisco.
"Together we were able to emphasisenot only the impressive international track record of NewZealand earthquake engineers, but also the value of bringingthem together as members of PWB s Earthquake Engineering andNatural Hazards clusters.
"More broadly, the linksbetween the Wellington region and San Francisco are alreadywarm, and I have been doing my best while here to promotesome new business and city connections," said Mr Lewin.
Some outstanding work has already been done betweenengineering and architecture companies from the twocentres.
One example is Wellington-based Holmes ConsultingGroup who are presenting their earthquake structuralanalysis software product at the Conference.
"The analysisis particularly valuable for investigating heritagebuildings and we have chosen a well-known heritage buildingin San Francisco as an example of its use," says HolmesConsulting Group technical director JasonMilburn.
Positively Wellington Business clusterfacilitator Graeme Carroll says Holmes Consulting Group isone of the few New Zealand companies to successfully breakinto this specialist engineering market in America, andestablish an American subsidiary to grow the business. Muchof the intensive analysis work is done in New Zealand andtransmitted via the internet.
The Wellington contingent spresentation was called New Zealand: Earthquake EngineeringHighlights From Middle Earth.
Speakers were Richard Sharpeof Beca Carter Hollings and Ferner, on New Zealandearthquake engineering expertise in the international arena;Russ Van Dissen and Robert Langridge of GNS Science, onearthquake geology research in New Zealand; Andrew King ofGNS Science, on the development of the New Zealand LoadingsStandard; Michael Pender of Auckland University, on site andeffects and soil-structure interaction in the New ZealandLoadings Standard and comparison with other codes; and HansBrounts of the Ministry of Civil Defence and EmergencyManagement, on earthquake engineering and emergencymanagement in New Zealand.
Philip Lewin s address at theSan Francisco Earthquake CentenaryConvention:
Presentation to San Francisco EarthquakeCentenary conference Tuesday 18 April 2006
Almostfamily .? Wellington Region and the Bay area as research,trade and investment partners.
Ladies andGentlemen
Wellington and San Francisco have a greatdeal in common -- a great deal more than earthquakepropensity. There is a strong relationship already inplace. This goes far beyond the seismological events we bothexperienced over the last 100 years, or the physicalresemblance of our two cities, to encompass investmentlinkages and many different business areas.
I m CEO ofthe Wellington region s economic development agency,Positively Wellington Business. My objective, in tenminutes, is to delight and enthuse you with the commercialattractiveness of the Wellington region -- a great place inwhich to employ smart and talented professionals, and theKnowledge Capital of New Zealand!
I m proud to be here atyour EERI Conference today with several leading members ofthe New Zealand Earthquake Engineering Cluster, which PWBhas assisted for several years now.
Relationshipsbetween California and Wellington have been important to thedevelopment of earthquake engineering. Famous innovationssuch as the lead rubber bearings designed by Bill Robinsonof Robinson Seismic, have come out of Wellington and areused extensively in California.
In Wellington, the baseisolation of Parliament was one of the largest seismicrefurbishment projects globally. Another is the US$200m baseisolation project for the new Wellington Hospital.
JohnHollings, who recently passed away, was the pioneer ofearthquake engineering in New Zealand, some of his peersconsidered him the most innovative Kiwi Engineer of hisgeneration. In 1968, Hollings firm merged with anAuckland-based consultancy to become Beca Carter Hollingsand Ferner, now New Zealand's largest consulting engineeringcompany. Beca now has a branch in California.
Withcollaborative projects, the benefits go both ways.Wellington's Lifelines Project focused on how to makeWellington a safer place. This was picked up byCalifornians for use in their market. Californians and NewZealanders worked together on a toolkit and a guidelinesmanual to upgrade earthquake standards. They had competitivecommercial interests but shared commercial IP in order toget value from the toolkit. There is further potential to domore professional sharing. More investment would be greattoo!
Ladies and gentlemen, in the field of earthquakeengineering as in many others, there is indeed a longhistory of personal and professional links betweenWellington and California. For example, GNS Science and itsCalifornian research counterparts have a growingrelationship. Technical experts from California are used inNZ tenders.
Holmes Culley, a San Francisco based NewZealand company, was awarded the Structural EngineersAssociation of Northern California (SEAONC) Award for BestRetrofit Project Using Conventional Technology for the SanFrancisco Piers strengthening.
And our Cluster haspursued a long-term strategy to build relationships into theuniversities. Ian Brown a member of the EarthquakeEngineering NZ Cluster is a graduate of Berkeley Universityof California; and Richard Sharpe's daughter has recentlywon a scholarship there. These relationships are important,as are closer linkages between our Victoria University ofWellington and Berkeley.
Other New Zealand -- focusedearthquake engineers who are wired into West Coastuniversities include Jeffery Martin - University of SouthernCalifornia, Robin Shepherd - University of California atIrvine, James Beck at Caltech, and Nigel Priestley and JoseRestrepo at University of California San Diego.
But wait,there s more! Graham Powell, Neville Donovan, DavidWilliams, Ron Mayes, Robin Shepherd, Ian Buckle, NigelPriestley, Martin Button, John Mander and Greg MacRae aresome of the New Zealand engineers that have landed in WestCoast of the United States and have become well known fortheir work. So at the Conference today you ve heard fromsome highly qualified New Zealand earthquake engineers.
Iam relatively innocent of any scientific knowledge myself,and so I shall not attempt to add to their contributions inthis sense.
But many of them are part of the marvellousachievements coming out of the knowledge economy inWellington in recent years.
Ladies and gentlemen,Wellington is a vibrant, dynamic, diverse city. We are theevents and arts and cultural capital of New Zealand. We are,of course, situated on the edge of a magnificent harbour andwe are surrounded by lush green hills. A lot like SanFrancisco!
Wellington leads New Zealand in the proportionof the workforce employed in the creative sector andcompares well with the top three creative US cities -- SanFrancisco, Austin and Boston.
We re looking for businessesto replace those which have decided Wellington is no longerthe centre of their universe and left to go on their Big OE.Those businesses, I have to say, usually have problemstaking staff with them.
Once they ve experiencedWellington, most people find it hard to leave. And itdoesn t have anything to do with salary, it s usually aboutlifestyle.
Knowing that lifestyle is one of the keyfactors for our citizens helps us determine what we shouldpreserve in our city and what we should build on.
We havedone research on this to find out what our citizens likedmost about the city. What gave it its sense of place, whatmakes Wellington different from other cities.
Our researchshowed there was a whole raft of things that our peopleloved about their city, from the quirky and whimsical to thesense of community, innovative architecture, the villageatmosphere, the bars and cafes.
The characteristic thatfeatured most strongly in the minds of Wellingtonians anddefined their sense of place however was Wellington scompactness how easy it is to get from one place to anotherwithin the City.
Wellington is experiencing huge growth intourism. In fact since 1997, international visitor nightshave grown by 18 percent a year and last year more than halfa million visitors came to see us.
Wellington now has morethan 3.8 million visitor nights a year, generating more than$900 million a year for the local economy. As you can tellWellington is on the up and if you like San Francisco,you ll love Wellington. After all, there is no place quitelike home!.
New Zealand is a source of not only wonderfulwines and foodstuffs and marvellous scenery but also clevertechnological applications, often in the creative space. Wellington has recently acquired a stellar reputation as afilm making centre. Much of the expertise developed byPeter Jackson and his collaborators has been influenced bypeople, production techniques and technology fromCalifornia.
There are many other strong investment andhuman linkages across the two regions. Improved direct airlinkages can only heighten this positive relationshipfurther. In a family sense, San Francisco and Wellington areideally suited to becoming sister cities.
New Zealandin general, and Wellington particular, have a great amountin common with the Bay area. The commonalities werehighlighted last August when our Mayor, Kerry Prendergasthelped to open the Toi Maori exhibition here in the BayCity. Let me say it again, just in case you missed it thefirst time round - if ever two cities were meant to becomesisters, it would be our two!
The close SanFrancisco-Wellington relationship is a great exemplar ofwhat our two nations New Zealand and the United States havein common. As a member of the NZ / US Business Council,later this week I will be participating in a New Zealand-USpartnership forum meeting in Washington DC. The aim of thishigh-level confab is to lift our bilateral relationship ontoa still higher and more enduring plane, and to ensure thatNew Zealand and the United States take every opportunity toformalise an even closer economic partnership.
ManyAmerican companies are already successfully investing in NewZealand. We offer some great competitive advantages. Forstarters, we re less heavily regulated than most -- and UScompanies find New Zealand s political and economicstability very attractive. We maintain stringent IPprotection, state-of-the-art broadband andtelecommunications facilities (thanks in part to some ofthese US companies!), and our costs for energy,accommodation, and technology are low by worldstandards.
On top of that, Wellington has great lifestyleopportunities; a vibrant CBD set among breathtakinglandscape; easy access to national and international marketswith excellent distribution links by rail, road, sea andair; cutting-edge research and development capabilities; andmost importantly of all -- a highly skilled, educated andinternationally adept workforce.
I ve already talked aboutfilm-making in Wellington. We have an ongoing convergencebetween communications, film, television, and entertainmentand other multimedia technologies. In many cases, just likethe movies, these industry players rely on high qualitycomputer-generated animation. Computer game developmentcompanies such as Sidhe Interactive are among manywell-known examples. Exciting new opportunities are likelyto arise in these areas.
The Wellington region also hassome core strengths in the biotechnology area. IndustrialResearch Limited is a leader in high temperaturesuperconductor technology, and Victoria University s Schoolof Chemical and Physical Sciences has a world-classreputation.
Likewise, industrial design is strong, both inapplication by some leading manufacturers such as Formway(office furniture), and the availability of specialistconsultants and education.
Now to end with a quick wordon my organisation, Positively Wellington Business (PWB).We re the economic development agency, jointly funded by theWellington region s five local government councils. As apublic agency, our services are free to client businesses.Among our many other capabilities, we assist business-peopleto take maximum advantage of the investment opportunities inthe region.
PWB can provide economic data, investmentopportunity listings and specialist contacts for one-to-oneassistance.
We have good contacts in the commercialproperty field and can prepare a detailed proposal on thespace options available within the region.
And we d loveto hear from y'all! So if you d like to learn more aboutbusiness opportunities here in the Wellington region, younow know where to find us -- www.pwb.co.nz or me personallyatphilip@pwb.co.nz!
ENDS
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