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CBD apartment a ‘nightmare’

Hanna McCallum

Moving into Century City Apartments in Wellington’s city centre was supposed to be the start of a new chapter for Carrone Conroy and his fiancee Sandra Malesic, who is eight months pregnant.

The apartment was close to work and family, and was affordable. But the six months living there had been ‘‘ a living nightmare’’, Conroy said.

Since moving into their seventhfloor apartment in mid-December, about 20 fire alarms had gone off – most of which were during the dead of the night.

In the first eight days of moving in, the alarm went off six times. One day, it went off at 11pm and again at 5am.

At first, the couple evacuated ‘‘vigilantly’’. But when they got outside, there were sometimes no more than 20 people evacuated from 140 apartments in the ninestorey building.

The first five levels are a public carpark. Part of the building also recently reopened as Tory Hotel, formerly Distinction Wellington.

Neighbours eventually told them ‘‘not to bother’’, because the alarms sounding happened so often, and were caused by members of the public using the carpark to drink and smoke.

Empty boxes of alcohol, cans, bottles and cigarette butts could be seen strewn across the carpark floors and stairwell – in the evacuation path.

‘‘It’s never been anything but in the carpark, never anything in the building,’’ Conroy said.

‘‘Trying to rest your head at the end of a long day and at the back of your mind, you’re mindful an alarm might go off, and you’ll have to evacuate. You can’t rest your head and get a good night’s sleep here.’’

Conroy said his biggest concern was the ‘‘apathetic approach’’ residents had to fire safety because of the frequent alarms.

He had raised concerns, including with the Body Corporate and Fire and Emergency NZ. A sign then went up in the lift to remind residents to evacuate in the case of an emergency.

‘‘It’s like they’re putting the onus on us, not to be trained out of evacuating because we’ve had 20 false alarms in six months. There’s no communication on what they’re doing about it, no apology.’’

Malesic said sleep was difficult to get as it was, and the recent fatal fire at Newtown’s Loafers Lodge had left her feeling terrified. ‘‘That was the breaking point for me.’’

The couple were now looking to move out.

A spokesperson for the Century City Body Corporate Committee said it took health and safety issues ‘‘very seriously’’.

‘‘The committee recently met with our neighbours, Wellington City Council, and Wellington police to help maintain a close working relationship and address issues as they arise.’’

Conroy said the constant fire alarms had affected his mental health and caused anxiety.

Nick Pyatt, Wellington district manager at FENZ, said many of the callouts in the past two years were in relation to the carpark and associated stairwell. Last year, FENZ recorded 20 callouts to the building, whilst 15 were recorded between the start of December and the end of May. Twelve were false alarms.

Capital

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2023-06-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

2023-06-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://stuff.pressreader.com/article/281595244914155

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