Steps to preserve valued heritage
Print Edition
OLD buildings in areas planned for renovation cannot be dismantled until they are examined and confirmed to have no historical protection value, housing administration officials said yesterday.
This is in response to local political advisers’ proposals for enhanced efforts to protect the city’s historical buildings.
One city location being protected and renovated is Zhangyuan, a residential area on Maoming Road between West Nanjing Road and Weihai Road. Vice chairman of the Shanghai People’s Political Consultative Conference Zhao Wen yesterday led officials on a tour of Zhangyuan.
Located near Wujiang Road, Zhangyuan is a relatively well-reserved shikumen architectural complex. More than 90 percent of its residential buildings will be preserved as a whole neighborhood in the renovation plan to maintain its historical character.
The government is now renovating roofs of buildings in the complex, strengthening the structures, laying new electric wires and installing fire sprinklers to make the houses in Zhangyuan safer.
To drive the city’s determination to protect its heritage, “we will identify the historical values of old buildings to classify them into categories of protection, reservation and dismantling,” said Pei Xiao, deputy director of Shanghai Housing and Urban-Rural Construction and Management Commission.
For those areas where the government had already announced detailed house requisition schemes, requisitions would continue, but dismantling of houses should be suspended until their historical value was identified, said Pei.
In areas where requisition schemes had not been announced, requisition scales would be decided according to the results of house value evaluations, he added.
In the future, surveys on historical buildings and house value identifications should be preconditions for all renovation plans in historic areas submitted by district governments, which must provide protection and reservation measures.
More than 400,000 square meters of residential historical buildings were renovated from 2010 to 2015, the 12th five-year phase, while for the 13th period, the planned repair size around the city will involve more than one million square meters according to the plans submitted by district governments, Pei said.
Shanghai has identified 1,058 outstanding historical buildings since 1989. These include 130 key protection units at national or city levels.
The city launched a new census of historical buildings and found 31,520 architectural properties built more than 50 years ago within the Outer Ring Road, covering about 25 million square meters. These include more than 7 million square meters of shikumen neighborhoods such as Zhangyuan and authorities wish to maintain all of them, according to Xu Yisong, deputy director of the Shanghai Planning, Land and Resources Administration.
“The census result showed that we will have to expand the protection and reservation scale,” said Xu.
Pei also told political advisers that Shanghai would set up a special fund to protect historical buildings.
Lawmakers were working out regulations on protection of historical and cultural features and outstanding historical buildings in the city.
“Reserved historical buildings will have legal identities, and responsibilities will be clearly defined for governments on different levels, as well as the property owners and users,” Pei added.
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