New Regent Street

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New Regent Street is a pedestrian mall in Christchurch. Built as a private development in the early 1930s with 40 shops in Spanish Mission architectural style, it is one of the city's major tourist attractions. Providing a number of small shops as a comprehensive development was an advanced idea at the time, and New Regent Street is regarded as a forerunner to modern shopping malls. Due to its coherent architectural character, the buildings in the streets are listed as Category I heritage items by Heritage New Zealand, and in addition, the entire street has a historic area listing. The street was pedestrianised in 1994 in preparation for the introduction of the Christchurch heritage tram, which began operation in February 1995. Damaged in the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake, the street and buildings reopened in April 2013, and the tram returned from November of that year. Following the 2016 Valentine's Day earthquake, five of the buildings that had not been repaired after the previous earthquakes have been cordoned off, which stopped the tram from operating on its original heritage loop until May.Background and locationNew Regent Street is located in the Christchurch Central City. It is oriented in a north-south direction and placed between Armagh Street at its north end, and Gloucester Street on its south side. Cathedral Square, the centre of Christchurch, is located one block over to the south-west. What is now New Regent Street was originally known as "The Circus paddock", as visiting circuses would make use of the land. From 1888, the land was occupied by a building called the Colosseum. The Colosseum was initially an ice skating rink, then used for a boot factory, became a taxi rank for some time and in 1908, it was Christchurch's first movie theatre. The Colosseum was demolished in January 1931.