The Christchurch City (Reserves) Empowering Act 1971 was passed by Parliament, and that provided an important legal basis for the closure of Victoria Street.

[5] Part of the proposal was to use the hotel as a convention centre in conjunction with the adjacent town hall, and to connect the two buildings via a pedestrian bridge at first floor level.

The landscape architects had chosen a plan with contoured earth mounds, and a meandering path towards the Avon River bridge; an earlier idea was to keep the symmetry of Victoria Square with a future pathway, in place of the road, going straight to the civic offices.

[7] Stage II of Victoria Square was formally opened on 8 October 1989, with poor weather forcing the ceremony and speeches to move into the adjacent town hall.

[9] The Crowne Plaza group secured a lease in the Forsyth Barr Building at the opposite end of Victoria Square[10] where it reopened in late 2017.