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Old Posted Apr 16, 2012, 4:09 PM
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Skyscrapers cause unease in the world's historic places

Overlooked heritage


March 30, 2012

By Simon Thurley



Read More: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/3be6a...#axzz1rxPwdAtN

Quote:
Forty years ago this year Unesco (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) adopted the World Heritage Convention. This ambitious project set out to identify world heritage sites – places that are deemed to have outstanding universal value (or OUV) for all mankind. The announcement triggered a worldwide scramble for recognition and there have now been 936 successful nominations. Of the world heritage sites, 183 are natural wonders such as the Grand Canyon and the Victoria Falls. The remainder are cultural sites and include the world’s most famous monuments: the Egyptian pyramids, the Acropolis and Stonehenge.

- Decisions have to be taken as to where the OUV starts and stops and, more controversially, how large a buffer zone the site needs around it to be protected from invasive development. As reported by the Financial Times on March 6, a massive development in the Liverpool docks in the UK was approved by the city council. This mixed-use mega-project will eventually bring 9,000 apartments to the city. Views from the 50th floor of the highest tower will be spectacular, looking over the River Mersey and the world heritage site in the city centre. But heritage bodies led by Unesco are aghast. These blocks of flats will, they argue, detract from the OUV. The question for Liverpool and the UK government is whether Unesco place their world heritage site on its danger list?

- Urban developments, such as the project in Liverpool, are a particular concern for Unesco. The case that defined the issue was Vienna, which already had plans to develop tall buildings on the periphery of its world heritage site when it was listed in 2001. The intention was to redevelop the area round the Wien Mitte station, including a cluster of high-rise buildings, the tallest of which was to be 97 metres. This generated widespread concern that historic Vienna’s tallest building, the cathedral (only 800 metres away), would be overwhelmed. In 2003 the mayor of Vienna stopped the scheme, but not before work had begun on the 87-metre City-Tower in Marxergasse, a commercial development of reddish sandstone capped by a swivelled glass cube. The Vienna case was regarded as a victory for the moral power of Unesco and led to the Vienna Memorandum – a Unesco policy statement about urban development.

- It is remarkable that Unesco has, with no real sanctions other than shame, managed to make a considerable impact on the planning policies of its 182 urban world heritage sites. This is not confined to developing countries wanting to belong to a European club. After Unesco missions to London and Liverpool in 2006 the former UK planning minister Yvette Cooper introduced powers to deal with controversial planning applications in world heritage sites. Indeed there is a sense in which cities in the EU have come in for special criticism as they “should know better”. Nobody has yet attempted to calculate the premium that people will pay for living in or overlooking a world heritage site, although the economic advantages of such places in terms of tourism have been investigated. Yet there is no doubt that developers will continue to see the value generated by tall buildings with sensational views of world cultural icons. What is surprising is that Unesco’s fuzzy concept of outstanding universal value and its wordy resolutions have had so much success. Developers with vast sums at stake put considerable resources into finding ways to build in and around world heritage sites.

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  #2  
Old Posted Apr 16, 2012, 6:42 PM
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I have no problem with development near world heritage sites, as long as the actual site is not damaged. If a building becomes overwhelmed by a nearby skyscraper or bridge, oh well, progress happens and cities change. As long as the site itself is intact, anything outside that border shouldnt matter.
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Old Posted Apr 16, 2012, 7:20 PM
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I think the Shard will be the first building visible from within the walls of the Tower of London and I don't think it's heritage/legacy is degraded as a result of it either.
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