From One Disaster to Another: Environmental Memory, Automobility, Suburbanisation and the Canterbury Earthquakes 2010–2011

Broadly taking up Amitav Ghosh's (2016) comment that when it comes to climate change ‘we seem to learn nothing; our historical imagination is very limited’, this article argues that disregarding environmental memory, and past knowledge to plan a more resilient future, the Canterbury Earthquakes 2010–2011 continued and enabled suburbanisation and an associated increase in car use and dependence in the region. This backward‐looking environmentally harmful development has occurred despite longstanding knowledge of the negative impacts involved. A case study of Rolleston, a rapidly growing town in the Selwyn District to the South of Christchurch, provides new evidence of New Zealand's mid‐21st century adoption of well‐critiqued ideas from the last century. The article argues that against an awareness of their role in creating environmental, social and cultural harm, in post‐quake Canterbury, both car dependency and suburbanisation are going from strength to strength.