NAVIGATING URBAN HERITAGE CONSERVATION IN HISTORIC DISTRICTS OF DALIAN CITY – INSIGHTS FROM REGIONAL CULTURAL EXPERIENCES
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.21837/pm.v23i36.1768Keywords:
heritage conservation, cultural landscape, historic districts, Zhongshan Square, Dalian CityAbstract
Responding to this crisis, the Chinese government has undertaken the initiative to conserve and revitalise the urban historic districts in recent years. However, it has been observed that the process of historical heritage conservation in China is significantly influenced by the top-down protection system that renders the heritage voiceless. Past studies have explored the context of urban heritage conservation based on morphological integrity alone. This necessitates examining the context of the conservation of historic districts from a micro perspective involving human behaviour activities and experiences. This article aimed to navigate the path of urban heritage conservation in historic districts of China from a micro perspective of reviewing the regional cultural experiences. To do so, this article focused on the case of the historic district in Dalian City in China particularly Zhongshan District which is known for Zhongshan Square surrounded by classical buildings built in the early 20th century. Following the field visit and qualitative interviews with the residents, the collected data in the form of transcribed responses was thematically analysed. This article presents the main themes identified from the thematic coding of the collected data. The findings from the interviews indicated that the residents were dissatisfied with the heritage conservation interventions implemented by the government. This article concludes that the dissatisfaction among the residents was attributed to the concerns of the residents about the lack of connection between heritage buildings and the urban textures of their surroundings and the lack of supportive policies. This calls for strategic measures driven by regional cultural experiences.
Downloads
References
Anne, S. (2013). Shanghai’s lost shikumen and villas in 2013. Shanghai Street Stories. https://shanghaistreetstories.com/?p=6351
Beitin, B. K. (2012). Interview and sampling. In The SAGE handbook of interview research: The complexity of the craft (pp. 243-253).
Cao, J., & Li, T. (2023). Analysis of spatiotemporal changes in cultural heritage protected cities and their influencing factors: Evidence from China. Ecological Indicators, 151, 110327.
Chan, W., & Ma, S. (2004). Heritage preservation and sustainability of China's development. Sustainable Development, 12(1), 15-31.
Chen, M., Liu, W., & Tao, X. (2013). Evolution and assessment on China's urbanization 1960–2010: Under-urbanization or over-urbanization? Habitat International, 38, 25-33.
Farrell, K., & Westlund, H. (2018). China’s rapid urban ascent: An examination into the components of urban growth. Asian Geographer, 35(1), 85-106.
Liu, Y., Dupre, K., Jin, X., & Weaver, D. (2019). Dalian’s unique planning history and its contested heritage in urban regeneration. Planning Perspectives, 35(5), 873-894.
Parry, R. (2007). Recoding the Museum: Digital heritage and the technologies of change. Routledge.
Ruan, Y., & Sun, M. (2001). Some problems in the protection of Chinese historic conservation area. City Planning Review, 25(10), 25–32.
Scott, J. C. (1998). Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. Yale University Press.
Wang, Y., Matsumoto, K., Wang, R., Zhou, W., & Sawaki, M. (2023). Investigating the potential historic conservation area in China: A case study on 11 old colonial cities. Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering, 22(6), 3718-3731.
Wu, C., Li, G., Li, Y., Pu, Y., & Zhang, Y. (2022, November). A review of research on strategies and methods for the revitalization of urban historic districts. In IOP Conference Series: Earth and Environmental Science (Vol. 1101, No. 5, p. 052021). IOP Publishing.
Wu, Z., Fang, Y., & Shi, Z. (2019). Research on spatial forms of historical and cultural blocks based on space syntax: Taking the Changmen historical and cultural block in Suzhou as an example. Architecture & Culture, 12, 36-38.
Xu, Y., Zhang, H., Tian, Y., Xia, X., Chen, X., Yang, Y., & Zhang, J. (2022). When technology meets heritage: A moderated mediation of immersive technology on the constraint-satisfaction relationship. Current Issues in Tourism, 25(4), 632-649.
Yang, C. (2022). Cultural landscape space system: A case study on the regeneration planning of non-historic and cultural old city of Tangyin. City Planning Review, 5, 81–92.
Yang, Z. (2021). Destructive reconstruction in China: Interpreting authenticity in the Shuidong Reconstruction Project, Huizhou, Guangdong Province. Built Heritage, 5(1), 1-14.
Zan, L. (2013). Economic discourse and heritage conservation: Towards an ethnography of administrations. Heritage & Society, 6(2), 167-184.
Zhang, H., Wang, F., Guo, F., Cai, J., & Dong, J. (2023). Urban built heritage protection and realistic dilemmas: The development process, protection system, and critical thinking of historic districts in Dalian. Built Heritage, 7(1), 25.
Zhang, S. (2022). The development and institutional characteristics of China’s built heritage conservation legislation. Built Heritage, 6(1), 11.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 Unported License.
Copyright & Creative Commons Licence
eISSN: 0128-0945 © Year. The Authors. Published for Malaysian Institute of Planners. This is an open-access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license.
The authors hold the copyright without restrictions and also retain publishing rights without restrictions.
