4th Baltic Sea Region

Cultural Heritage Forum

THE HISTORIC URBAN

LANDSCAPE APPROACH

Dr Lodovico Folin Calabi

UNESCO World Heritage Centre

10 September 2010, Riga

Global Phenomenon

Timbouktu

Timbouktu

Saint Petersburg

Background and Process within the

framework of World Heritage

• Request for new criteria for regulation and management

(UNESCO World Heritage Committee, July 2003)

• Vienna Memorandum, issued by the conference "World

Heritage and Contemporary Architecture - Managing the

Historic Urban Landscape” (Vienna, May 2005 )

• Request for new UNESCO Recommendation (July 2005)

• WH General Assembly “Declaration on the Conservation of

Historic Urban Landscapes” (October 2005)

Process

8 Expert Meetings:

• Jerusalem (June 2006)

• UNESCO Headquarters (September 2006)

• Saint Petersburg (February 2007)

• Olinda, Brazil (November 2007)

• UNESCO Headquarters (November 2008)

• Zanzibar, Tanzania (December 2009)

• Rio de Janeiro (December 2009)

• UNESCO Headquarters (February 2010)

Institutional Partners:

ICOMOS

ICCROM

UIA

IUCN

IFHP

IFLA

OWHC

AKTC

IAIA

World Bank

Process

• Request in 2009 for proposal to include the Historic Urban

Landscape in the Operational Guidelines

“Historic Urban Landscape shall be considered as an

approach, a management tool – and not an additional

category”

• Adoption by UNESCO General Conference of Resolution

35C/42 (October 2009) authorizing Director-General to

develop a new Recommendation on HUL to be discussed at

Inter-Governmental Meeting (Category 2) in Spring 2011

& submission to GC in Fall 2011

Process

• 2005 Vienna Memorandum = CATALYST to

initiate discussion and bridge the gap until adoption

of new Recommendation

• ICOMOS : Global Discussion Groups on HUL with

Revision of Washington Charter

• UNESCO WH Centre participated in dozens of

HUL conferences & seminars worldwide

• Historic Urban Landscapes perhaps most widely

discussed conservation topic at the moment

Background

Current Issues in Urban Conservation

• SETTING: old and new urban pressures

• CONTEXT: loss of tradition and continuity

• Developments happen OUTSIDE Conservation

Areas

• INSIDE: Limits of Acceptable Change?

• Discipline has NO TOOLS for Objective and

Scientific Assessment – INCONSISTENCY

• VALUES-Based (or SIGNIFICANCE-Led)

Conservation Management

Historic Urban Landscape:

A New Paradigm?

• Recognition of dynamic nature of living cities (vs. static “monuments” or “groups of buildings”):Change & Continuity

• Landscape approach to urban heritage: layering of significances

• Broadening of perception and new tools

• Broadening of OUV and Context (genius loci) as Guiding Principles

• Follow morphologies and typologies

• Visual, Socio-Economic and Heritage Impact Studies

• For all cities (not only those inscribed on World

Heritage!)

• Definition of Historic Urban Landscape as an

Approach, not a new category

• Concise and Comprehensive: tool for local

governments

• References to geo-cultural specificities to indicate

DIVERSITY of TRADITIONS, but adaptation to

local context is key

Draft Recommendation

2011

Adoption of the UNESCO

Recommendation on the Historic

Urban Landscape

Work-in-Progress

Please visit

• http://whc.unesco.org/en/cities

• http://whc.unesco.org/fr/villes