Protecting historical places involves various approaches. One such way is for government or response companies to perform regular checks for any damage, which they can do through inspection programs.
Many organizations and individuals play an active role in preserving historic properties. This includes developers, community groups and property owners themselves; while the National Park Service administers grant programs.
Renovate and Rebuild
Renovating or reconstructing an historic building can preserve its historical integrity while simultaneously modernizing and adapting it for future changes. However, renovation and remodeling are two distinct processes and should be approached carefully in order to avoid adding features which detract from its original architectural style.
Restoring historic buildings can be an extremely powerful economic force, creating jobs in the construction industry and revitalizing neighborhoods. Restoration also promotes tourism and generates income for communities, while helping preserve its legacy while informing future generations about its cultural history.
Many historical properties can qualify for federal funding via grants, tax incentives and preservation funds. Exploring these avenues to restore a property may prove fruitful as often they have specific guidelines that must be abided by – design criteria or preservation methods must often adhere to specific requirements that need to be fulfilled – GHP offers professional preservation architect services to guide this process and ensure all requirements are fulfilled.
Persuade the Public
Protecting historical places requires persuading others of its importance. To do this, they can employ various means including incentives, regulations, public education campaigns and advocacy to accomplish this.
Education can take place through various mediums, from websites and brochures to tours of historic sites and buildings. As more people learn about a threatened location, the greater their likelihood is of standing up for it.
Noting successful preservation, rehabilitation and reuse projects is also beneficial; such initiatives can serve as models for those whose properties may be at risk.
Economics studies and statistics can be an effective means of persuading key audiences, but must be presented in an engaging fashion that resonates with your target audience. Grandstanding may work for some elected officials; conversely, one-on-one dialogue might prove more productive.
Control the Daily Visitor Number
Historical sites and buildings play an integral part in building a sense of place in communities, so their preservation should be seen as of great importance. Furthermore, these landmarks often serve as focal points for community gatherings that foster pride and unity within local populations.
Maintaining historic places can be challenging. Tourists can overrun historical sites, leading to damage and dispersion of artifacts.
One way to preserve historical places is to limit their visitor count daily, either through ticket reservations and tours or time zone restrictions that limit visiting times for specific hours – for instance, Ise Grand Shrine in Japan restricts visitation to 20,000 visitors each day; this allows visitors to explore while protecting its monument.
The Law and Policy
Historic places need a strong and supportive community to safeguard them, whether from conversion to surface parking lots or neglect. Residents can support historic places by hosting fundraising events, making donations to preservation projects, volunteering restoration work or advocating for preservation funding from county or city levels.
The federal government can play an active role in historic preservation by encouraging and funding local projects that conserve historic sites, buildings and districts. Federal laws such as Section 106 review require agencies to take into account how their actions will affect historic resources when making decisions that affect them.
Other policies, like preservation ordinances and listing on the National Register of Historic Places, offer stronger forms of protection. There are also various organizations focused on historical preservation worldwide – ICOMOS is one such organization, advocating theory, methodology, and scientific techniques for conserving cultural heritage – its members including architects, art historians, archaeologists, geographers, landscape architects engineers town planners among many others.
