Les trois vies successives d’un atelier ferroviaire du XIXe siècle : Eveleigh (Sydney, Australie)

Cet article a pour objet l’histoire des Ateliers d’Eveleigh à Sydney, en Australie, considérés à trois étapes de leur longue vie. L’article évoque d’abord rapidement l’origine du lieu et sa conception novatrice et monumentale pour un établissement de maintenance des années 1880. Ensuite, l’article s’étend plus longuement sur les transformations les plus marquantes du site, au début du XXe siècle. Entre 1908 et 1920 en effet, Eveleigh devint un lieu de construction de locomotives. Il subit une réorganisation considérable en vue de son adaptation aux pratiques modernes de gestion du travail utilisées dans les industries d’Amérique du Nord. Cette période est cruciale : l’établissement de maintenance d’une modeste entreprise coloniale se métamorphosait pour constituer les grands ateliers d’une compagnie ferroviaire de taille moyenne, désormais intégrée dans une économie industrielle. L’auteur traite enfin de la réhabilitation et du destin du site à la suite de sa fermeture en 1988. Le processus de reconversion fut en effet très long et n’est pas encore achevé. Mais il est important de noter que tous les bâtiments historiques ont été conservés et que la plus grande partie de l’équipement industriel a survécu. Eveleigh continue donc d’assurer des fonctions variées qui témoignent d’une économie et d’une société modernes. Il traduit le triomphe des valeurs patrimoniales et prouve, à l’évidence, que l’élaboration des technologies de l’avenir peut s’inspirer des succès techniques du passé. Car la haute technologie de la « nouvelle économie » est maintenant le moteur de la fonction commerciale d’Eveleigh, tout comme ce fut l’industrialisation de la colonie en pleine croissance qui engendra Eveleigh il y a plus d’un siècle.This article deals with the history of the Eveleigh workshops in Sydney, Australia, considered in three stages of their long life. The origin of the place, its innovative and monumental design for a maintenance facility of the 1880’s is first addressed quickly. Then, the article tackles the most significant transformations of the site that occurred at the beginning of the 20th Century. Between 1908 and 1920, Eveleigh became a place of construction of locomotives and underwent a significant reorganization in accordance with modern labour management practices used in the North American industries. This period is crucial: the establishment of maintenance of a modest colonial company developed to constitute the major workshops of a railway company of medium size, now integrated into an industrial economy. The author finally addresses the fate and rehabilitation of the site following its closure in 1988. The conversion process was indeed very long and is not yet completed. But it is important to note that all historic buildings have been preserved and that the greater part of industrial equipment has survived. Eveleigh continues to perform various functions which reflect the current economic and social modernity. The high technology of the "new economy" has become the engine of the commercial activity of Eveleigh, as it was born, more than a century ago, of the industrialization of a growing colony. In that way, the former workshops reflects the triumph of the heritage values and also demonstrate clearly that the development of the technologies of the future can learn from the technical achievements of the past

Best of Intentions: The Historical Development of Education in Architectural Conservation

This thesis traces the origins, development and international spread of postgraduate architectural conservation education. Highlighting fundamental questions about the architect’s role in heritage conservation it also carefully considers the relationship between new design and the protection and care of historic buildings. It analyses the evolution of specific courses and the role of leading individual figures in light of intensifying discussion about principles and education at postwar conservation conferences. Based on historical archival material and interviews with participants, the thesis documents the educational backgrounds and roles of a series of key promoters of conservation education and underlines their subsequent influence on the field. The analysis of individual influence and the links between these actors constitutes a prosopography, or collective biography, for architectural conservation education. This collective biography crosses national borders and explains the common elements of postgraduate courses around the world. The network of relationships between key educators was particularly strong between those from Anglophone nations, facilitated by a common language and shared histories. By attending to conservation education the thesis documents the breadth and intensity of efforts to define the boundary between architectural education in the general sense and conservation specialisation. In doing so, it highlights the unstable boundary between architectural design and architectural conservation. Finally, taking this difficulty into consideration, the thesis examines the opportunities and the difficulties involved in establishing an accredited heritage conservation/historic environment profession

Transforming industrial urban waterfronts : industrial heritage and tourism

The transition from Fordist production to post-Fordist flexible production since the late 1960s has affected cities in spatial, economic and social ways. Throughout the world, former industrial sites located in urban centres have witnessed deindustrialisation as a prominent change, and have been threatened by the rise of neoliberal urban and economic transformation interventions, such as gentrification and waterfront redevelopment. These two forms of urban transformation have started to create globally renowned tourist precincts, but at the same time they have exposed both heritage and the community to the prospect of insolence. This thesis examines the Sydney waterfront areas of Darling Harbour and The Rocks, which have been transformed in different socio-political contexts and at different times. Tourism is now a global phenomenon involving hundreds of millions of people, and urban tourism is acknowledged as an essential component of a city’s economy. Urban centres are investing in viable forms of tourism and growth, encouraging major infrastructure developments such as waterfront precincts. Waterfront areas have always played an important role in urban environments – in the early stages as working ports, which acted as hubs for trade and shipping. However, in the latter part of the 20th century, there was a shift from production to consumption on the waterfront. Due to the modernisation of shipping technologies, many port areas were left abandoned, forcing city councils to search for different usages to mitigate economic decline. Attempts to transform waterfronts from industrial spaces into tourism/leisure precincts became a popular approach, but have also triggered concerns for the heritage of these places. Industrial heritage, which consists of both physical remains and memories of places and the industrial processes themselves, is considered as an indication of development. Since European settlement, the area from Sydney’s Darling Harbour to West Circular Quay was developed as a working port and as a hub for the marine industries. These areas have remained part of the main urban centre in Sydney. However, when they became redundant, development decisions by the state government of New South Wales changed these industrial landscapes through a long-term strategy that aimed to transform the city’s waterfront into a world-class tourist destination. The study explores the significance of the industrial heritage assets of Darling Harbour and The Rocks and the implications of the transformation procedures. The case-study areas have always been considered success stories of transformation with mixed touristic, recreational, residential and commercial activities. However, this research examines and evaluates how the significant industrial historical and heritage values have been affected. It argues that tourism/leisure-led developments create urban landscapes in which cultural identity and historical assets are sacrificed

Conservation of Heritage Curtilages in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Built environment heritage is increasingly vulnerable in South East Asia due to increasing urbanisation and rapid urban development. This dissertation examines the value of the concept of heritage curtilages in Malaysia, with an explicit focus on Kuala Lumpur. The concept is still relatively new in the field of heritage conservation and it is closely related to concepts of setting or context. Curtilage comprises a broader aspect as it takes into consideration all elements involved in retaining heritage curtilage and interpreting the significance of a specific heritage item within an area. Among these elements are the functional uses, visual links, scale and significant features. The conservation of heritage curtilage has the significant potential to enhance the richness and contextual settings of heritage buildings in Malaysia. While conservation efforts are improving, there is still limited research which focuses on the implementation of heritage curtilage as a conservation practice and a strategy. Moreover, it is necessary to improve understanding of how heritage curtilage relates to and enhances the significance of individual heritage places. This dissertation initially discusses the theoretical issues and complexities related to the definition of heritage curtilage, with reference to specific initiatives in Malaysia, as influenced both by the local legislators and international heritage organisations. This discussion is followed by a comparative analysis of Gazetted heritage buildings in Kuala Lumpur. The study is further informed by a series of open-ended interviews with selected practitioners, conducted in Australia and Malaysia, who were invited to define and visualise the value and importance of local heritage curtilage in Malaysia. The results from the comparative analysis and interviews provided detailed insights into the current conservation issues related to heritage curtilage development in Malaysia. The findings revealed varied disciplinary understandings of the theories and the concepts of heritage curtilage as well as diverse attitudes to the legal aspects of implementing the concept of heritage curtilage in Malaysia. Based upon qualitative analysis of this data, this dissertation has defined the relevant criteria that could be applied to identify local heritage curtilages. This criterion is therefore proposed with a view to aid future Malaysian conservation efforts together with effective legal implementation. Hence, it is intended that this criteria will establish a methodological and procedural framework to conserve the heritage significance of the curtilage of Malaysian heritage buildings and not just buildings in their own right.Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Architecture & Built Environment, 201

The Authenticity of Community Participation in Heritage in New South Wales

This thesis is concerned with the role of the community in the conservation of its cultural heritage. In the current pro-developer climate, built heritage in New South Wales is under constant threat, coupled with significantly reduced heritage conservation funding across all tiers of government. A broadened understanding of who heritage belongs to, and who should be involved in decision-making processes, has resulted in efforts by powerholders to develop policies that emphasise the importance of community participation. The aim of this research is to investigate the authenticity of those participation efforts and the actual power of the community to influence the outcomes of the decision-making process. This research centres around three case studies: Strickland House, Carrathool Bridge and the Sirius Apartment building, each a site owned by the New South Wales State Government that included a significant level of community consultation as part of determining their fate. The thesis draws on both oral testimony and primary documents to investigate the authenticity of the consultation processes, alongside the seminal 1969 work of Sherry Arnstein and later interpretations of her Ladder of Citizen Participation. Where communities have then taken on the role of activists to protect their heritage, the tactics and strategies they employed to enact change will be examined in conjunction with models for nonviolent confrontation, including community organiser Bill Moyer’s Movement Action Plan. The case studies indicate that often there is no real power for negotiation and no assurance that the public’s concerns and ideas will be considered. There appears to be a gap between the written strategies and statements of government heritage departments and agencies, and the reality of implementation and genuine collaboration. The actual role of the community often amounts to little more than government rhetoric. By utilising classic social activism tactics to protect sites of cultural significance, local communities can gain the power to influence the protection and management of their heritage denied to them by the powerholders

Examination of Cultural Significance of Places: Circular Quay, Sydney

This thesis studies the meaning of cultural significance of place, and is concerned with Circular Quay, Sydney, in an attempt to determine the various aspects which contribute to the area’s cultural significance. It sees the area from a wide variety of viewpoints, and uses the area’s diversity as a catalyst for considerations pertaining to the understanding of place generally. It deals with the growing heritage process which has drawn world-wide attention to the phenomenon of place significance, and attempts to show how this process has led to present place evaluation techniques. It considers the acknowledged tools used in assessing place significance, and explores ways of improving and/or augmenting such tools in order to provide the means for assessing cultural significance of place in the second millennium. Circular Quay is an unusual place in many respects. It is the oldest (postcolonial) place in the youngest (and last) major colony, situated in the oldest country in the world. Its status as the site of the First Settlement gives rise to divergent viewpoints, and its post-colonial history has exerted more influence on Australian identity than perhaps any other Australian place. Its physical attributes and setting, once appreciated by both European and Aboriginal cultures as constituting an exceptional natural environment, are once again being appreciated, this time as an extraordinary cultural environment, as we approach the year 2000. Traditional place assessment techniques reside principally in the criteria used to determine whether or not a place possesses a sufficient degree of cultural significance to enable it to be listed in a heritage register. Such criteria have evolved in response to the world’s disappearing heritage, which the various heritage registers attempt to identify so that steps may then be taken to preserve what remains. To date Circular Quay appears on no formal heritage register, although some of the items in the area are listed. This thesis attempts to show how places like Circular Quay can be assessed for their cultural significance, which at present lies outside the scope of the various criteria, and how modified and/or additional criteria can lead to the inclusion of such places in heritage registers