TOWARDS NEW INTERNATIONAL GUIDELINES FOR THE CONSERVATION OF HISTORIC URBAN LANDSCAPES (HUL)

At its 29th session in July 2005 (in Durban, South Africa) the World Heritage Committee recommended “that the General Conference of UNESCO adopt a new Recommendation to complement and update the existing ones on the subject of conservation of historic urban landscapes, with special reference to the need to link contemporary architecture to the urban historic context” (Decision 29 COM 5D). In view of an ever-increasing number of cases, where development or regeneration projects were considered a threat to the Outstanding Universal Value or integrity of sites registered on the World Heritage List, the World Heritage Committee expressed a need for the establishment of new guidelines and tools to properly assess urban development schemes and contemporary architectural interventions in historic context. The issue was not a new phenomenon indeed, but had been under debate in the urban conservation discipline for decades already. However, it is believed that the conditions under which urban projects are currently being developed have changed profoundly. This, supplemented by the fact that the last UNESCO Recommendation on the subject of urban conservation was established more than 30 years ago, makes a review of current issues and ways to deal with them more pertinent than ever. This paper provides an outline of new approaches being developed on the conservation of historic urban landscapes as part of UNESCO’s role as a standardsetting organisation and in preparation of a new Recommendation on the subject.