Urban heritage conservation in Hong Kong: thefeasibility of adopting area-based conservation approach under HongKong's planning system

Abstract

At a time when the world is becoming more monotonous under the effect of globalization, diversity has become precious. To retain the different colours of culture, cultural heritage conservation has been widely practiced in many countries. Starting from the 1970s, international conservation organizations have been advocating for area-based conservation. They believe that the goal of heritage conservation, which includes the conservation of both tangible and intangible assets, can be better achieved by conserving areas at an urban scale. In order to facilitate area-based conservation, many countries have integrated conservation with town planning. In Hong Kong, heritage conservation does not protect areas at an urban scale. It only serves an advisory function to town planning and fails to protect the landscape around historic buildings/sites. Under the fast pace of development, this building-based conservation approach has created a fragmented cityscape of Hong Kong as bits and bobs of historic structures are surrounded by incompatible features such as parking garage, flyovers, highways and skyscrapers. This ruins the spirit of the place, decreases the heritage value of the site and consequently diminishes the character of the city. This study attempts to improve heritage conservation in Hong Kong by finding out the feasibility of setting up conservation areas in the city. It explores the importance of heritage conservation, the significance of area-based conservation, and the success factors for setting conservation areas in Singapore, which has shown successful in preserving historic districts and areas of special character by area-based conservation. By reviewing Hong Kong‟s current practice in heritage conservation and town planning against these success factors, several recommendations are conducted at the end.