Dorset Street in the Central City, Christchurch

Dorset Street – Formerly Park Street. Named because of its proximity to Hagley Park. Re-named Dorset Street. Named after Dorset, a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. Park Street first appears in street directories in 1885. Re-named Dorset Street on 7 March 1904. Among a number of streets re-named in 1904 and given the names of place-names in the United Kingdom.A small amount of information from the library website and nothing that I can add about the name of the street. I believe that the reason for renaming was that councils merged and there were duplicate names.Hardly any mention on Papers Past apart from death notices. In 1905 there was one letter to the editor signed ratepayer complaining about the state of this street and the neighbouring Dublin St. In the same year the council announced that they would be doing channelling work. In 1921 there was a note about no buildings to be built with 33 feet of the centre of the street.There is one house here from 1910 and I suspect that it would be the Dorset House Backpackers. I vaguely recall a friend staying here and I was sure that it was called Dorset Guesthouse but I am going back to 2009 so my memory could be faulty. There are buildings from 2015 and they are at Hagley Park end. I was surprised to find out that the ugly buildings opposite Dublin St have a heritage listing. They are called Dorset St Flats and designed by Miles Warren and built in the late 1950s to early 1960s. Described as a good example of Modern Movement. Damaged in the earthquakes and currently under repair. I had no idea what is happening at the Victoria St end except that a big building seems to be going up. Googling tells me that it is possibly Bishopspark Retirement Village and I vaguely recall that there was objections to this earlier in the year. It will be replacing the complex that was damaged in the earthquakes. I thought at the time that if I had to go into a home that it would be a convenient location being so close to the city and Hagley Park but after seeing them in flesh so to speak not so sure.Trying to search for details on Papers Past wasn’t easy as there were so many entries for a Dorset St involved the Jack the Ripper murders