Transforming Cities : Planning and Preserving in Historic Urban Contexts

Abstract

This volume introduces research that highlights connections between historical planning strategies and heritage conservation during transformation processes of European cities in the 19th and 20th centuries. Case studies from various countries, including Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania, and the United Kingdom, focus particularly on the period following the Second World War. One of the aims of this volume is to address planning theories and practices of built cultural heritage conservation in the capitalist Western European context as well as parallel developments and urban transformation processes initiated or undertaken by communist and socialist regimes in Central and Eastern Europe. Specific emphasis is placed on the developments in former communist countries by highlighting continuities and discontinuities from the interwar period to the Second World War as well as in the context of the regime changes after 1989. The authors cover a wide range of topics at the intersection of planning history, urban history, historical geography and monument preservation. This volume does not claim to be exhaustive; rather, through an interdisciplinary and transnational lens, it seeks to pave the way for future studies examining the transformation processes of cities.