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residences, and that levies for the
necessary infrastructure invest-
ments do not become prohibitive.
This type of analysis would help
guide the levels of service and
standards to be used for the
upgrading.
The alignment of the results
of these different analyses, all
yielding positive incentives for
the different groups of actors,
along with an effective overall
economic analysis capturing the
international dimensions of the
heritage questions, is still not enough to solve the Rubik‟s
Cube. The political process within which these decisions are
undertaken, the involvement of the local communities, the
participation of the poor, the empowerment of the key actors in
the neighborhoods, especially women, and the manner in which
this is all done are all critical to make an urban rejuvenation
and conservation effort a success. Only when we have
mastered these aspects as well as the financial and economic
aspects will the Rubik‟s cube yield to an elegant and
deceptively simple solution!
The Institutional dimension
Clearly, the nature of the institutional arrangements in a
particular city could help or impede the search for the elegant
solutions of the urban cultural heritage Rubik‟s cube. The ar-
rangements are usually complex and bureaucratic. They involve
multiple agencies and many bureaucracies but are not adequate
to actually involve many of the inhabitants or to address the
needs of private investors who could be key in rejuvenating the
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economic base of the historic city. One of the approaches that
could be explored in this context is the use of a historic district
development authority. Elsewhere, I have written about this
aspect of the problem, but the idea is simple enough: to cut
across the forests of red tape with one bold piece of legislation
and to structure its decision making in such a way that it
provides accountable but effective and efficient management
with a primary responsibility for all aspects of the historic area.
One key innovation would be to recognize the rights of
all actors in a set of shares that could be allotted in proportion to
the stake they have in the geographic area under consideration.
This would give the government a significant position to start
with since the government owns through the public spaces a sig-
nificant part of the land. The market value of rented space could
also be recognized in the allocation of shares in this system.
How to Conserve: Adaptive re-use and flexibility
The need to preserve has to be matched by the need to
provide flexibility of reuse. Experience shows that excessively
rigid adherence to restoration standards, i.e. where nothing is
changed from the original can lead to less than optimal use of
the properties. A case from the UK is instructive: two buildings
in Bath, of exactly identical appearance, one of which was to-
tally remodeled from the inside, basically allowing a totally
different layout while maintaining the facade unchanged, the
second being maintained and remodeled exactly as it was both
inside and outside. The former rented at L18 per sq.ft. the
going rate; the latter remained vacant for 2 1/2 years. This calls
into question the need to review the prevalent practices in con-
servation to ensure that purity of purpose does not constrain the
ability to strangle the economic and social revitalization of
historic city cores.
Examples from Washington DC also bear out this need
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for flexibility. Successful private redevelopment has sometimes
carried flexibility to extremes of “facadism”. An example is the
Red Lion row-houses on Pennsylvania Avenue, where the faca-
des of old residential buildings are protected, but the interior
spaces are combined for commercial use and linked to new and
discrete architectural construction.
A more interesting example is the restoration of the Wil-
lard Hotel. The Willard Hotel in Washington DC represents a
very successful effort at architectural conservation and addi-
tion. The historic hotel whose lobby was such an important
meeting place in the 19th century that it gave us the term ”lob-
bying” in the language, has been restored in all its splendor.
However, to make the renovation project pay, the developers
had to build a new addition of commercial offices and shops.
This was very elegantly done, echoing but not copying the
architectural motifs, and cascading downwards from the roof
line of the original. A more muted color tone, a gentle setback
around a courtyard and the whole is that most elusive of all
successes where the new not only blends with the old, but
actually enhances it. It is one of those rare cases where the
whole is indeed more than the sum of the parts.
Affordability and the poor
The vast majority of those living in the dilapidated buil-
dings of old historic cores of the cities of the developing coun-
tries are poor. Yet, it would be mistake to assume that all those
who live in historic cities are poor. Far from it. There is con-
siderable wealth in pockets of the old cities, and commerce
there seems to be very remunerative, if for no other reason than
the enormous densities and frequent tourism. Yet, it is the poor
who are most at risk of involuntary displacement and/or of
being squeezed by the cost recovery of new infrastructure in-
vestments executed in ways and at standards that have more to
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