The Auckland Harbour Bridge and computer science in New Zealand

I was driving over the Auckland Harbour bridge last week and thinking, I don’t really trust New Zealand engineering. This is possibly because I got to witness the catastrophic collapse of two New Zealand buildings in Christchurch not long after they’d been deemed safe by engineers. Although it has since transpired that the so-called engineers who gave one of those buildings the green light, were not engineers at all but city council employees. The next time someone tells me a structure is safe because an engineer has said so, I simply won’t believe them.

The Auckland Harbour bridge on the other hand has been given a “catastrophic failure” warning by engineers. That was in 2007 and presumably after cracks appeared in 2006. They have since spent millions of dollars strengthening and making it safe. Or have they?

The bridge was built in the 1950s, but built too small. Less than a decade later, the city council commissioned some clip-on lanes from a Japanese firm which ended up costing much more than if they had built a bridge of sufficient size right from the start. The additional lanes are called the Nippon clip-ons and were considered to have a life-span of 50 years. That was 1968. I think I’ll stick to the center lanes from now on.

New Zealand is predominantly an agricultural economy. When I first moved here, I completed a post-graduate diploma in secondary school teaching, thinking I could become a computer science teacher. I quickly discovered that computer science is virtually non-existent in New Zealand schools. Instead they have a technology curriculum and the IT arm of this is more focussed on learning to use software rather than learning how to create it. Big difference. The whole situation is rather abysmal. I believe *everyone* should learn some computer science in schools given the importance and prevalence of this technology in our society. When I was in high school in Brisbane, Australia – 20 years ago now – we did some computer science in maths. Hell, I even did some in primary school in the form of set theory. I feel the New Zealand education system is making a colossal screw-up by not offering computer science to school students. Unless of course, New Zealand wants to remain a predominantly agricultural economy.  I realise I could write letters and voice my concern to those in positions of power, but I haven’t the time or the inclination and I’d rather just whinge about it on my blog. So there.