The superb photograph in the Herald of a milk truck which almost completed its journey through three houses reveals a serious flaw in New Zealand house design.
We devote an enormous amount of energy and money to making our buildings earthquake resistant. We even demolish buildings before giving them a chance to demonstrate that they could have survived an earthquake. Statistics however suggest we may have got our priorities wrong. In 2006 more houses were demolished by milk trucks than were demolished by earthquakes.
The Building Act should be urgently reviewed to provide consumer protection against milk trucks.
Implementing the new 2007 regulations should not be difficult. We obviously know how to design house resistant milk trucks. We only need to let the truck designers try their hand at housing.
Tony Watkins
Karaka Bay
First published in the NZ Herald 3 January 2007