Abstract :
[en] Over the last fifteen years, the policies of the European Union have been focusing on the sustainable development of cities and regions, based on social cohesion. Those policies also address the challenges faced by European municipalities due the worsening climate crisis. Researchers from RWTH Aachen University are contributing to one of the Actions of the Urban Agenda for the EU and developing recommendations for the European Commission. Their research project, launched by the Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning (BBSR), explores the intersections of the topics of resilience and building heritage in order to promote an integrated approach to risk management for built
heritage in European cities. The research led by Prof. Christa Reicher (RWTH, Chair of Urban Design and Institute for Urban Design and European Urbanism) and Prof. Dr. Carola Neugebauer (RWTH, Chair of Conservation of Cultural Heritage), in cooperation with Prof. Dr. Stefan Greiving (TU Dortmund, Institute of Spatial Planning), focuses on the built heritage as a major cultural, economic and ecological resource, which is crucial for the sustenance and resilience of urban communities of different levels and scope. At the same time, it recognizes the built heritage as vulnerable to a range of risks and disasters, both human-made and non-anthropogenic. The research project examines the ways to interconnect and strengthen existing integrated approaches in the field of risk and heritage management in European cities. It addresses the insufficient connectivity between different fields and actors: between heritage and risk management and between different levels within each field; between the prevention and adaptation activities of urban and spatial planning, on the one hand, and the preparations for potential threats and disasters by civil protection, on the other. It also indicates the already existing opportunities provided by the legal regulations which are not being used. The main goal of the research is to define the Guiding Principles for Resilience and Integrated Approaches in Risk and Heritage Management in European Cities. Those will be combined in a hand book for municipal practitioners in European cities. The project findings will also serve as a basis for policy recommendations, which will be presented to the European Commission in the first half of 2022. Locally, the produced results will be assessed and evaluated in a gaming simulation in a German city.
