Summary of Conference papers read by:

Conference Overview by Ingval Maxwell

Ingval Maxwell

Concluding the conference with an overview of the day’s events, Ingval Maxwell from Historic Scotland said that ‘Conservation’ is becoming a difficult word to use. It is beginning to smack of elitism, and could emerge as being the enemy of the good if the broader perspective of the built heritage is taken into account. A better way of expressing the physical requirements of heritage buildings might be to refer to the need for ‘repair and maintenance’. This more accurately reflects on the current 50/50 split between ‘repair and maintenance’ and ‘new build’ in the construction industry.

In his Conference introduction, Martin Wyatt, BRE Chief Executive, ably set the scene by describing BRE’s reuse of one of the two listed historic buildings Airship hangars at Cardington. He also noted that heritage buildings should be considered as part of the overall building stock.

The Chairman, Jeff West, also emphasised in his opening remarks that sustainability was at the heart of current English Heritage thinking.

Presentation by David Tomback
Along with offering a relevant economic perspective, David Tomback raised other important parameters when he identified that tourists come to see the built heritage, but noted that cities ‘compete’ with each other in this field. What does this say? It identifies the need to recognize that individuality and regional variations are relevant to the debate. What makes this issue important is the need for recognition of a range of traditional materials that were originally used and how they combined in form, function, detail and performance to create that individuality. Add to that the craft skills and educated understanding in their use and there emerges a need to avoid negation of the inherent quality, significance and value of each place.

Presentation by Derek Latham
Derek Latham picked this theme up by warning of the dangers of creating theatre sets for tourists, reflecting strongly on the 1993 ICOMOS Training and Education Guidelines in his approach, and these also came through in his 10 (or was it 17) homilies. These were pragmatic, realistic and relevant in a way that also reflected the use COTAC made of them in their S/NVQ development work. His case for their application to ensure sustainability of the entire buildings stock is fully justifiable, and is to be encouraged.

Presentation by Peter Trotman
Peter Trotman’s case to promote whole life costing as a decision-making support tool is critical in the current era. In his presentation he emphasised that data gathering was important. Ingval Maxwell picked this up in his overview, saying that whilst we have detailed statistics on the European dimension about cars, butter and wine, we actually know little about the real state of our buildings! COST Action C5 Urban Heritage/Building Maintenance is a 3-year EC programme that is a year away from submitting its final report. It currently estimates that the dwelling stock of Austria, Belgium, Germany, Hungary, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland and UK is 112½ million utilised units. Arranged by date,20½% were built pre 1919, 15% in 1919-1945, 30% in1946-1970, 28% in 1971-1990 and the rest since 1991. It is estimated that in UK, 28.8% of homes were built pre-1919 (the highest of all the 11 countries in the COST C5 programme) followed by Austria at 22½% and Germany at 20.4%.

Minimum maintenance, refurbishment and renovation costs have been more difficult to establish. But emerging data from Flanders, East and West Germany, Scotland and Northern Ireland indicates that a basic repair cost/dwelling is approximately 2,700 Euros. Taking the estimated112½ million units in the survey area a current repair bill is projected at over 303½ billion Euros. Given this projected amount, understanding and implementing sustainability thinking is essential. But if sufficient associated technical information was also to hand, statistics such as this would be ideal for preplanning purposes such as indications of material supply and skills demand needs.

Therefore, the trends in attitude as illustrated by Kathryn Bourke’s whole life costing “changing expectation” charts are very important. They well illustrate that a greater awareness of the relevant issues is coming to the fore.

Presentation by Peter Brimblecombe
Peter Brimblecombe also well illustrated this aspect through his research work – looking to the past can assist in determining how to help address the future. He also set the challenge of how long we can expect to retain the past. In this regard, the emerging understanding of current European repair costs of 2,700 Euros/average dwelling needs to be considered against how much it would cost to build everything completely afresh. Trends in the UK construction industry figures suggest that the current 50%split of the repair and maintenance proportion is rising. The conclusion is self-evident. There must be a greater focus on the economic reality of reusing more of what we have currently here.

Presentation by David Tomback
Paul McMahon reported on the Leonardo supported Heritage Skills programme in a way that served to emphasise this reality.

In the past whole life cycle costing issues were intuitively understood. The benefit of adopting traditional skills and using traditional materials in a knowledgeable way needs to be re-learnt and promoted. He also emphasised the benefit of using the ICOMOS Guidelines and COTAC’s adoption of them. Historic Scotland too is convinced of their value, and is currently working with the Professional bodies to ensure that the Accreditation Schemes (for individuals working in the field of conservation) fully recognize these gains. If these benefits are to be achieved on the remaining physical fabric – whatever the age – the process of educating, relearning and re-evaluating an understanding of the past must occur at all levels.

Fran Novak’s guidance through BRE’s CALIBRE CD-ROM ably illustrated how modern technology can assist in this process. Although we have much to learn from reassessing the past, such an approach has its place in disseminating the results.

Presentation by Stephen Bond
Stephen Bond brought us full circle to Martin Wyatt’s opening comments. He also raised a further challenge. Emphasising that our cities are not made up from a few select sites, but are an aggregation of styles, periods and developments, his assertion that “management” should emerge as a key aspect in our future thinking has a high degree of relevance. He argued that it was a mechanism that should be accommodated in the development of Conservation Plans and I would support his view that it could be a useful tool to aid progress here.

Throughout the day, the lively question and answer sessions illustrated the breadth of interests in the conference topic, and delivered presentations.

The Conference theme ‘Profiting from Heritage Buildings’ might also be raised as a question. For me the answer to that is a resounding yes, we can; we all can! COTAC is to be congratulated in bringing together such a worthwhile event, and for addressing the issues in such a positive way.

Adapted from an article in Natural Stone Specialist by Eric Bignall. GL, with further contributions from Ingval Maxwell, Historic Scotland