Developing Historic Cities: Keys for Understanding and Taking Action

This publication is based on the first version of the compilation of case studies on conservation and management of historic cities Historic Cities in Development, Key to understanding and taking action finalized in October 2012 and published online in two volumes. The 2014 edition is published in a single volume, and is translated into English and Spanish, and appendices have been updated.

This report, which consists of a compilation of case studies on the conservation and management of historic cities, is based on four structuring principles: a finding: heritage, whose design has known for a few decades a profound change, becomes a key challenge at the heart of the urban issue; a certainty: heritage values are unique, in that they are not reproducible, but the action of the cities in the management of heritage represents experiences and know-how that are highly instructive and useful for all the historic cities; a conviction: heritage management by local governments necessarily interacts with urban projects; an ambition: the safeguarding and valorization project of heritage may and must become a development lever for the cities. 

This report draws together all these elements in order to serve as an example as regard the problems, the methods, the know-hows, and to be useful to all those that are in charge of heritage management or simply mobilize themselves for its safeguard and its improvement.