Monitoring the complexity of change of a World Heritage site after the inscription on the World Heritage List

In 1972, the General conference of UNESCO adopted the Convention concerning the protection of the world cultural and natural heritage. Since 1992, the Committee has taken different measures to strength the control and management over the World Heritage List. During this meeting, inscription procedures and listing requirements were reviewed. But special attention was taken in heritage management procedures which were translated into processes for a reactive monitoring and periodic monitoring. Since these actions were established, the need to distinguish between monitoring (a continuous cycle) and reporting (a “snapshot” taken at a moment in time in the life of a heritage element) has been raised. The issue is relevant as in 2012 Latin America is going through the third period of periodic reporting. According to UNESCO reports, documents and practices, monitoring is seen as a continuous process that looks at changes on a site over periods of time. It aims at contributing to achieve the World Heritage Committee´s strategic objectives and to facilitate heritage management and therefore to decision-making. In 2003 Tony Walton on his report “Methods for Monitoring the Condition of Historic Places” states: “monitoring is the act of measuring change in the state, number, or presence of characteristics of something”. In light of this statement, it is clear that most of the world heritage sites in spite of the importance of the writing of Periodic Reports, lack monitoring instruments; which could allow them to trigger control measures to prevent, correct or mitigate problems in a preventive conservation approach. Therefore, this paper will present the identification of “indicators of change” as the support to develop a GIS based monitoring system. Through them this research will try to identify the elements on where change resides to finally evaluate the conservation of heritage values in the historic city of Cuenca - Ecuador.

Jaar van publicatie:2011