"Canterbury Police make the official move to Christchurch’s Justice and Emergency Services Precinct, Te Omeka"

This Monday 19 February Christchurch Police are making the move to Christchurch’s Justice and Emergency Services Precinct, Te Omeka.

A colour parade ceremony was held today to symbolise the move by Police into their new home.

The moving of the Police colours and flag shows they are ready to defend and protect the community from harm.

The Te Omeka complex will house Canterbury District Headquarters, as well as Christchurch Area Headquarters and the Southern Communications Centre.

Police will join other agencies such as St John Ambulance, Fire and Emergency NZ, the Ministry of Justice, Department of Corrections and Civil Defence.

Metro Area Commander, Superintendent Lane Todd says this is a positive move for Police.

“We are looking forward to being able to work more closely with our partner agencies.

“Moving to this co-locate premises will enhance our ability to come together and mean we are more responsive and offer a better service to the people of Canterbury”.

In addition to this, the building is designed to continue functioning for up to 72 hours in the event of an earthquake or other emergency.

“We will be working in an extremely safe environment and in the event of such an emergency we will be better equipped to keep the community safe,” Superintendent Todd said.

Many people took the opportunity to take a look at the precinct, including the police watch house and cells, at the open day in September last year.

As of 19 February no public services will be available from the former Police building on St Asaph Street, and all central police station services will be operating from Te Omeka.

The first Police station in Christchurch was established in 1873 and stood for 100 years before being replaced in 1973 with the 15 storey high-rise Christchurch Central Police Station.

At the time it was the tallest building in the city.

The old Christchurch Central Police Station was extensively damaged in the 2011 Christchurch earthquake.

The move to Te Omeka and the closure of the former Police building ends nearly 140 years of having a Police presence on Hereford Street.

The relocation for the Police Southern Communications Centre is planned from 7am on Tuesday 27 February, to be completed by 4pm on Wednesday 28 February.

During this time 111 and *555 calls will not be answered at South Comms.

Instead, extra call-takers have been rostered on at Central Communications in Wellington, and at Northern Communications in Auckland, ensuring there is no reduction in service to the public.

The public will not notice any difference when they phone Police.

As is usual, any call made to Police will be handled by the first available call-taker, no matter where in the country they are.

There is no change to the Christchurch Central station phone number or the opening times - 7.00am - 9.00pm Mon - Sun (not Public Holidays).

To find Police in the Te Omeka building, the public are advised to use the entry at 40 Lichfield Street.

There is no visitor parking on-site, however an option is the multi-level public car park on Lichfield Street.

It currently does not charge for the first hour of parking.

There are three mobility impaired car parks on Lichfield Street near the entrance to the laneway and street motorcycle parking can be found in several locations, the closest being on Tuam and Mollet Streets.

ENDS

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