INTRODUCTION
While the
World Heritage Convention is a relatively new conservation
instrument, conservation activity has been taking
place consciously and unconsciously, throughout
the life of our historic towns and urban quarters.
Were it not so, such centres would not exist.
Over the life of such towns, those
involved in their management have evolved a great
range of tools and mechanisms to maintain their
characteristic heritage attributes. Some involve
high degrees of regulatory control and involvement;
some high degrees of citizen involvement and support.
These may include expropriation, regulatory control,
financial incentives (including tax rebates, grants,
low-interest loans, density or rights transfers),
design review, design guidelines and public education.
The appropriate use of each depends on establishing
full understanding of the cultural values of these
ensembles, and the sites and elements within such
values lie.
Choice of the most appropriate
tools for any community will involve an assessment
of several related factors : the resources and capacities
of a community, the nature of the existing threats,
the particular qualities it is desired to protect
or enhance, the climate of support for heritage
conservation, the impact on other legitimate public
mandates, and the time-frame in which it is desired
to achieve results.
Communities have widely varying
resources available to them, and consequently widely
differing capacities to act in protection of their
heritage. These resources may be financial, material
and human. Where group or individual resources appear
to be lacking, in recognition of the shared public
benefits of conservation, it may be necessary for
towns to adjust their priorities in order to allocate
public resources more properly to those benefits.
Tax rebates, financing incentives, outright grants
- all are examples of financial mechanisms designed
to alter that framework and improve the attractiveness
of the heritage conservation option.
Communities also reflect widely
varying states of maturity and development in their
regard for, and definition of heritage. Those where
consciousness is low may require short-term measures
to protect heritage elements in the face of immediate
threats. Where public interest in heritage is sufficiently
high to provide a measure of insulation from the
prospect of loss, then the most appropriate mechanisms
for long-term success are likely those that continue
to build heritage interest and commitment in the
population.
In each case two complementary
questions are required : what characteristics are
the chosen mechanisms meant to respect? What characteristics
are the mechanisms under consideration most likely
to encourage?
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ORGANIZATIONAL
STRATEGY
The development of an effective
organizational strategy among those involved in
implementation of conservation programmes or activities
requires attention on at least three levels : development
of the conservation team; utilization of a conservation
process and understanding and realization of conservation
plans.
The conservation team must include
and integrate the contributions of individuals from
a variety of disciplines. The conservation process
must encourage their collaboration in defining a
city's heritage character and supporting elements,
and in actions which support that character. And
the conservation plan must embody the particular
goals established within the studies which accompany
the process.
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THE CONSERVATION TEAM
Within the planning departments
of historic cities concerned with heritage conservation,
responsibility for heritage programmes is usually
assigned to planning personnel. As the number of
people involved in the programmes grows, it is useful
to ensure that their composition reflects the multidisciplinary
nature of the best conservation work.
Effective conservation departments
within civic government will usually be characterized
by the following:
- representatives from a variety of the research
and investigation disciplines working together with
each other; - a team approach to decision-making
and programme planning in which the various disciplines
contribute equally in choosing directions.
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THE CONSERVATION PROCESS
Conservation is value based. For
a particular site, building or ensemble, the conservation
process first establishes the heritage values invested
within it. Once these values are clarified, the
conservation process then permits the assessment
of the impact of possible options, and the choice
of those of least harm to the values identified.
Respect for the conservation process
in historic cities requires the members of the conservation
team to follow its steps. Documentation, evaluation
and inventory permit the identification of values
to be maintained; development options may then be
measured against these.
The conservation process ensures
a minimum intervention approach, focusing as it
does on minimizing negative impact on values. Successful
employment of the process also requires assessment
of functional needs, and delineation of other criteria
which options must meet.
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THE CONSERVATION PLANNING
Even when the choice of conservation
tools to be used flows from scrupulously careful
application of the planning process - even when
the tool employed is designed to respond in holistic
fashion to a variety of integrated concerns - once
in place, those applying it may lose sight of its
link to larger goals.
It is important to retain all
of the analysis that has gone into the choices made,
so that required adjustments are made to the strategy
as a whole, not just to isolated elements.
Perhaps the most convenient means
to provide such direction is to incorporate a community's
strategic choices in a document that incorporates
the basis for the choices made, that makes reference
to the significant qualities it is desired to manage
and that describes the targets (or criteria) that
actions are to meet if successful. This instrument
is usually called a conservation plan.
1. the differences between zones created through
designation can intensify over time, and the disparity
between "have" and "have not" increase;
2. it can artificially slow the economy of an area
by preferentially directing development investment
to zones where least resistance is anticipated (while
nearby, more significant buildings suffer increased
neglect);
3. the reasons for the distinctions made are quickly
lost sight of; the plan therefore loses its ability
to respond flexibly to new circumstances;
4. the plan may provide developers with aggressive
development opportunities, without accompanying
responsibility for integrating their efforts with
other objectives.
The best conservation plans are
those that don't permit the "why" to be lost sight
of, where actions are clearly related to defined
problems or values and where the impact of changes
may be readily envisioned on an entire system of
integrated programmes and tools.
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