St Mary of the Angels Archives - Page 2 of 3

Rule change benefits St Mary of the Angels

Inner-city Marist church, St Mary of the Angels is the first to benefit from a City Council rule change.

On Thursday, the earthquake strengthening project got a windfall $100,000 from the Building Heritage Incentive Fund’s $1.2m 2016 budget.

The City Council changed its rules to help heritage building owners to get on with urgent strengthening work.

The move came after the recent 7.8 Kaikoura earthquake.

Until Thursday, building owners could not start a project until they secured money from the fund. Now they can begin the work and apply for funding retrospectively.

Retrospective funding will last for the rest of the Council’s financial year.

The new money will go towards the $150,000 reinstatement of the heritage cork-tile floor and Maxwell Fernie organ.

Inner-city Lambton Ward and Greens councillor Iona Pannett raised objections to the retrospective funding.

However another Inner-city Lambton Ward councillor, Nicola Young supported the move and also proposed the $30,000 increase from the originally budgeted $70,000.

Accused of a conflict of interest, Young said there wasn’t any as she didn’t believe in God and so she’s not going to heaven anyway.

Grateful for the funding, St Mary of the Angel’s parish priest Fr Barry Scannell SM, said that if strengthening work had not been undertaken, St Mary’s would have gone the same way a Christ Church Cathedral – “damaged and abandoned”.

Source: Stuff

St Mary of the Angels needs $1.3m

Fr Barry Scannell, Parish priest of St Mary of the Angels, Sunday 30 October, gave parishioners a progress report on the seismic strengthening of the iconic inner-city church.

Work on the seismic strengthening began on St Patrick’s Day in 2015 and over the last 18 months the project has consumed 30,000 hours on

Completely new ground beam foundations running the length of the church
47 ground anchors throughout the nave to tie the new foundations to bedrock
32 further anchors to anchor the towers
Replacement of 10 ornate columns
Replacement of the main portals
New shear walls at the end of the Church
New steel cross bracing above the existing ceiling lining
New gutters behind the parapets in the roof
Build new foundations under the two towers.

Currently 40 tradespeople are on site.

As at 30 September, the total amount raised or committed to the project is $8.7 million.

The work ahead

To complete the task the church requires a further $1.3 million in order to

complete the structural work including
- 1200 sq meters of new roof
- 370 sq meters of sprayed concrete walls on the side chapels
- 50 tonnes of structural beams and braces
- 500 sq meters of new flooring and
- 100 LED lights
reinstate the Maxwell Fernie Organ
remedy the drainage problem in the Crypt and Choir Room
reinstate the vestry and sacristy
repair and reinstate 14 stained glass windows in seismic frames
reinstate the gardens and laws.

Speaking to parishioners at Mass, Fr Scannell expressed considerable gratitude for the generous donations received from individuals, family trusts, charitable foundations, the Lotteries Commission and Wellington City Council.

“Your generous support is allowing work to continue uninterrupted.

“If the generousity continues we will finish work in time to celebrate the 2017 Easter liturgies in the church”, he told parishioners.

Fr Scannell also expressed his thanks to the project’s patrons: Right Honourable Jim Bolger, Sir David Carruthers, Sir Anand Satyanand, Sir John Todd (RIP) and Dame Beverley Wakem.

St Mary of the Angels was closed following the earthquakes on Sunday 21 July 2013.

While the earthquakes did not damage the church, subsequently, engineers discovered the building was 15-20% of the New Building Standard.

After considering several strengthening concepts, mid 2014 it was decided to settle on one that retains the Church’s integrity and strengthens it to be as close as possible to 100% of the New Building Standard.

Donate at www.smoa.org.nz

Digger in the sanctuary
On site meeting: Parish priest Fr Barry Scannell with Wellington City Councillor Nicola Young and LT McGuinness representatives
A more recent view of the sanctuary area.
Ground anchors tie the new foundations to bedrock
Securing the side chapels
Replacing 1200 sq m of roof

Traffic chaos adds cost to inner-city church earthquake strengthening

Traffic congestion in Wellington city is adding to the price-tag of the donation-funded St Mary of the Angels earthquake strengthening.

It is the view of St Mary’s Parish Priest, Fr Barry Scannell who made the comment in Wellington’s Dominion Post newspaper.

Fr Scannell’s comment came in response to complaints that four major construction projects in Boulcott St are contributing to significant congestion in the city.

Fr Scannell claims that St Mary’s is a ‘good citizen’ and he disputes that work on the inner-city church is adding to the congestion.

With excellent project management at St Mary of the Angels, most of the work is off the street. The parish has also purchased five parking spaces.

“The church paid $800 a week to the council to hire five parking spaces off the road where trucks and work vehicles could park, and unload materials,” he told Joel Maxwell of the DomPost.

Other work on Boulcott St includes a revamp of the old Dominion Post building, seismic strengthening of the Majestic Centre and construction of an eight-storey apartment building.

Helen Moate, of McKee Fehl, project manager for the revamp of the former Dominion Post building, said the company worked with the council on a plan for dealing with congestion on Boulcott St.

A spokeswoman for the apartment development said also said the construction was covered by the traffic management plan submitted to the council, adding their building would be finished in a few weeks’ time.

The DomPost was unable to reach the Majestic Centre owner Kiwi Property for comment.

Wellington City Council spokeswoman Victoria Barton-Chapple said the Council there were traffic plans in place but the Council had no control over the completion of the projects.

Source: Dominion Post

St Mary of the Angels to re-open Easter 2017

All going well, St Mary of the Angels church in Wellington’s inner-city will re-open by Easter 2017.

Parish Priest, Fr Barry Scannell SM, confirmed the date on Thursday.

Talking to Wellington’s Dominion Post, Fr Scannell is delighted with the Church’s progress and the effort of a lot of people.

“We started the year with nothing and we ended up with around about $7 million,” he said.

“That’s a great effort by a lot of people and certainly a long way along the road to the $9.5 we need to strengthen this beautiful building.”

Currently a construction zone, the inside of the Church looks very un-church like, however once the strengthening is finished it will be hard to notice that anything has been done.

With stained-glass windows a plenty, installing 50 ground anchors, fixing 10 columns, 9 portals and the roof is not easy, however contractors LT McGuinness got creative.

Site foreman Matt Pattinson told the Dominion Post that a massive steel scaffold was created and placed on rail tracks so it could move along the floor of the church, providing a safe environment for workers while propping up the roof.

“It creates a safe zone within the building. In the event of an earthquake, the frame is actually the safest place to be on site. It’s been engineered to be stronger than the building itself.”

With talk of reinstating Christ Church Cathedral ramping up of lately, those involved with the garden city church had been in the capital to learn more about the St Mary of the Angels strengthening, Pattinson said.

“It’s been great to see some interest from Christchurch . . . if you’re talking about a safe zone, they’ll certainly need it. It’s quite extensive work that would be happening there. They’ve got bits of roof that are caving in. It’s a real hazard.”

Those wishing to donate to preserve St Mary of the Angels are invited to visit the St Mary of the Angels website for more details.

St Mary of the Angels, staffed by the Marist Fathers is believed to be the world’s first neo-Gothic church built using reinforced concrete.

In 2010 the Church was presented with an award at the NZ Concrete Society’s annual conference.

Bestowed biennially by the NZCS, the award recognises excellence in the use of concrete in building and civil engineering structures more than 25 years old.

Sources

Wellington city’s diversity marked by mid-winter event

Barry-Scannell-Ave-Maris-Stella — Parish Priest of Marist Inner-City parish St Mary of the Angels, Fr Barry Scannell SM displays Ave Maris Stella T-shirt designed for the occasion.

The diversity of Wellington city and mid-winter were celebrated by St Mary of the Angels parish in Wellington on Saturday.

Well over a thousand people attended the event called “Festival of the Stars – Ave Maris Stella,” held at St Patrick’s College, Wellington.

Sponsored by St Mary of the Angels, the singing, music, dance and food event brought together the many diverse cultural elements of the city parish community.

Parish Priest of St Mary of the Angels, Fr Scannell SM described the event as “wonderful” and “very inner-city”.

“It’s fantastic to be able to express and show the wide variety of cultures and to do it in a way that helps the seismic strengthening of St Mary of the Angels.

“Māori, Chinese, Korean, Philippino, Tongan, Irish, Polish, Indonesian, English and New Zealand cultures all participated”, he said.

It is the first time St Mary of the Angels has hosted such an event and event organiser, Mr Robert Oliver already has plans for 2016.

“I hope it is going to be bigger and even better.

“Ave Maris Stella encapsulates something very Wellington, very New Zealand at the moment”, he said.

Mr Oliver explained the genesis of “Ave Maris Stella” as the bringing together of two ideas; the opportunity to celebrate mid-winter and the need to raise another $4.5m to strengthen the St Mary of the Angels church.

Mr Oliver said he tested the idea of a mid-winter festival with people in the parish community and it sort of spread out into the other elements of the wider community.

Asked how much the event will raise, Mr Oliver described the amount as “peanuts” in comparison to what is required.

“It’s not really just about the money”, he said.

“Ave Maris Stella shows we want to offer something to the community, we are part of the community.

“It also shows we’re trying to do something towards raising this massive sum of money”, he said.

Last week the St Mary of the Angels Charitable Trust received $1.7m from the Lottery’s Commission, leaving it with a further $4.5 to raise.

“It also shows we’re trying to do something towards raising this massive sum of money”, he said.

Mr Oliver said he tested the idea of a mid-winter festival with people in the parish community and it sort of spread out into the other elements of the wider community.

“Ave Maris Stella encapsulates something very Wellington, very New Zealand at the moment”, he said.

The irony of holding a inner-city event in Wellington’s eastern suburbs was not lost on Mr Oliver.

“We’re in exile at the moment while this beautiful inner-city Church is closed for strengthening, and we are very lucky to have such a strong relationship with St Patrick’s College”, Mr Oliver told CathNews.

Last week the St Mary of the Angels Charitable Trust received $1.7m from the Lottery’s Commission, leaving it with a further $4.5 to raise.

Source: CathNews NZ Pacific

$9.3m to strengthen St Mary of the Angels church

Strengthening St Mary of the Angels church in central Wellington, New Zealand is going to cost about $9.35 million.

The parish priest of St Mary of the Angels, Fr Barry Scannell said that at present it met between 15 and 20 per cent of the new building standard and would need significant work on its foundations and structure to bring it as close to 100 per cent as possible.

Engineers, architects and geotechnical consultants had spent months preparing plans for the project, which was expected to take 18 months to complete.

Scannell said money needed to be raised before work could start. He expected the strengthening would have to be done in two stages.

“The first stage is the structural stuff below the floor slab. The cost of that is about $2.8m and we would like to get on to that as soon as we raise the money.”

The church would need help from wherever it could get it because the archdiocese, which had responsibility for many other churches, was not able to help.

St Marys also had a small pool of parishioners – before the quake an average of 650 people attended mass each week.