Chapter IX
OTHER PRESERVATION ISSUES
Is there a loss to the historic significance of a
building if it is moved from one site to another? Yes, there
will always be some loss. The significance and meaning of a historic
building are always connected to its original location. Therefore,
moving a historic structure from its original location should
always be carefully evaluated.
In New England, where there is an abundance of older houses that are desireable properties when renovated; the market there is quite strong for updated historic homes. Some developers have taken advantage of this market.
When James H. Andrews wants to expand a subdivision he is developing in this rural town in southern Maine, he shops around for an 18th- or 19th- century house and moves it to his 39-acre property.
Mr. Andrews owns the land, so he pays only for the building and its moving and renovation costs. His staggered development style has insured his economic survival at a time when many builders are bankrupt.
In some situations, moving a building is appropriate, or at least acceptable. For instance, if moving is the only alternative to demolition, then relocation may be necessary. The National Park Service and its technical preservation services encourage moving only as a last resort.
To stay on the Register, the owner has to convince us that the new site will be compatible.
There is a long tradition in the U.S. of moving buildings, but
creating a neighborhood out of moved buildings because a developer
likes it creates a false sense of history and how that neighborhood
developed. Even if the setting and landscaping are re-created,
some of those buildings were never meant to be seen next to each
other.
An important element in any commercial historic district is the use of signs. These prominent features are a salient feature of the urban environment, and should be compatible with the historic area and reinforce its general character. When developing an ordinance to control signs, attention should be paid to two issues-first, how to get rid of unsightly or inappropriate signs and keep historically important signs and, two, what are the design requirements for appropriate new signage.
To avoid the unintentional loss of significant cultural or historic resources, the area should be surveyed and an inventory should be taken of signs worthy of protection. What determines whether a sign is significant enough for protection? Culver City, California has established three criteria, any one of which is sufficient for designation.
1. The sign must be of "exemplary technology, craftsmanship, or design of the period in which is was constructed....
2. The sign is integrated into the architecture of a significant building or structure.
3. It demonstrates extraordinary aesthetic quality, creativity, or innovation, as determined by the historic commission.
Another approach to preservation is the wholesale
exemption of certain areas of a city from the sign ordinance.
For instance, in the area of Baltimore
known as "The Block" a gaudy mixture of brightly lit
neon and flashing bulb signs give the burlesque district a character
that would be destroyed by the enforcement of the city's sign
ordinance.
One of the continuing concerns, from a sociological standpoint, of establishing historic districts is that many times the very goal for establishing such a district-to stabilize an older, perhaps transitional, neighborhood and improve the value of its properties-is counter to social needs. Many poorer individuals and families can only afford to live in areas of a city where rents are quite low. As these areas become designated as historic districts and properties are improved, values go up, rents go up, and more affluent residents are attracted to the area. Former residents are forced out and they must look elsewhere for affordable housing. This process is known as "gentrification," for it "gentrifies" the neighborhood and makes it more exclusive in character.
What has come to be known as gentrification-the migration
of (mainly white) middle-class homesteaders into poor (mainly
black and Hispanic) urban neighborhoods-is neither the cause nor
an effect, exactly, of the historic renovation boom...The original
'60s militants of the preservation movement were the shock troops
of the upper middle class, and it was a broader swath of the same
class who in the '70s made living amid urban antiquity seem both
virtuous and stylish. Restored carriage houses and pressed-tin
ceilings have seduced more children of the suburbs back to the
city than mean, shiny apartment towers.
Historic preservation is often seen in a very different light by members of minority groups. Their most relevant traditions have not been of buildings and land, but the oral traditions-the stories of the families-and to them this type of preservation is more meaningful and appropriate. The buildings revered by white society as important emblems of their heritage typically represent oppression and slavery to the African-American community. As one black resident bitterly observed, "The only thing that theater was good for was putting me in the balcony." Blacks couldn't choose where to live, and often they don't want to be reminded of neighborhoods that they may have left only recently. Preservation often brings higher rents and real estate values to a neighborhood, pricing out the poor who need affordable housing more than they need historic housing. Therefore, preservationists in those areas should not consider historic preservation as an end in and of itself, but rather work at strategies to improve housing that will also preserve historic structures.
With Native Americans, the U.S. government has long had a policy of encouraging assimilation into American culture, rather than preserving their traditional tribal culture and way of life. This has led to the destruction of many Native American traditions, rather than an emphasis on their preservation.
Recently, however, the preservation movement has
made serious strides identifying structures that are meaningful
to minorities and varous cultural groups. The Washington, D.C.
home of Frederick Douglass, the 19th-century
civil rights leader and orator, became the first major African-American
site to be part of the National Park Service
system when acquired in 1962. This gave it increased recognition,
as well as sufficient funds for its restoration and continued
maintenance. Other cultural landmarks are also gradually receiving
the recognition they deserve.
Historic Preservation has primarily focused on cities and their historic landmark buildings and districts. Recently, however, increasing attention has been paid to protecting our rural heritage, including hamlets, individual farms and their structures, and especially the conservation and protection of agricultural land. Under current market conditions, agricultural land is often worth much more to its owners when sold for suburban development than when kept and farmed. It is difficult to expect a farmer to ignore this economic reality, and as a result, large areas of prime agricultural farmland, especially farmland closest to larger urban centers, are lost each year to speculative development.
Communities now recognize that such a changeover in land use not only takes additional farmland out of productive use, but also leads to further sprawl of urbanized areas and the degeneration of city centers and the urban core. Over the years a variety of programs have been tried to protect rural areas. In the 1950s, programs of differential taxation were established, with farmland being taxed based on its value as agricultural land, rather than on its "highest and best" use for development. Later studies revealed that such programs enhanced the income of farmers who intended to keep farming anyway, but that they did not significantly discourage the sale of farms that were opportunistically situated to be sold for development, since the income from the sale would be so much greater than possible tax savings.
Maine enacted the Farm and Open Space Tax Law in the 1970s. This gave farmers a tax incentive for preserving open space, farms and forests by allowing for lower property taxes for such uses. Because tax assessors were unsure how much property taxes should be reduced, in 1993 the state legislature issued guidelines as follows:
Open Space Rates
w/o public access w/pub. access
Ordinary open space -20% -45%
Land used for forestry of
farming but protected from
future development by permanent
easement restrictions -50% -75%
"Forever wild" open space
(land protected by a permanent
easement and used for no
commercial purpose whatsoever -70% -95%
A land use regulations approach also was tried in many communities. By creating agricultural conservation zoningagricultural conservation zoning, farmland could not be sold for intense development. This also reassured farmers that they would not be subject to "nuisance suits" from irate suburban homeowners who had moved in next to a farm and then complained about the noise and smell from farm operations. In New YorkNew York State, over 300 conservation districts have been formed, controlling approximately 6 million acres, or well over one-third of the state's farmland.
Some programs have included a provision in which owners could
sell potential development rights for use in a different part
of the township or county. In Purchase of Development RightsPurchase of Development Rights
(PDR) programs, the cost of obtaining development rights can vary
considerably, based on the location of the land. "For example,
in 1984, the average per acre cost of the rights purchased was
$807 in MarylandMaryland, $2,802 in
New HampshireNew Hampshire, and $4,209
in Suffolk County, New YorkNew York State.
Since participation in all PDR programs is voluntary, these figures
represent a free-market exchange between the landowner and the
government."
One way to preserve rural areas is to contain urban
sprawl. The concern with encroaching sprawl has led some communities
and states to adopt the concept of urban growth boundaries.
In Oregon, growth boundaries define the limits of
urban area growth, and allow only very low density land uses beyond
them. This prevents creeping urban sprawl found at the edges
of most other American cities. The technique accomplishes three
things: "it contains the cost of infrastructure, it protects
the environment, and it helps prevent piecemeal destruction of
the exurban landscape."
Cherry Hill is a small, historic hamlet located in Canton Township in southeastern Michigan. It is just beyond the current edge of development in the western suburbs of Detroit. The residents of Cherry Hill recognized the imminent threat of development overtaking their rural character, and commissioned a study to show how the character of their hamlet and the surrounding farmland could be protected.
The proposal presented to township authorities dealt
with community concerns at three different levels. First, the
buildings that made up the hamlet itself were to be grouped in
a historic district. Although the buildings
individually were not especially significant, the district was
justified on the basis that, as an assemblage of structures from
various periods, they represented a historic community type that
was rapidly disappearing. Cherry Hill represented an excellent
example of a rural hamlet with most of its architectural and cultural
history still intact.
At the second level, a farmland conservation areaagricultural conservation area was established covering the area generally surrounding Cherry Hill, and large enough to provide a visual barrier against future suburban development. The edge of this farmland area was screened visually with rows of trees at the edge of existing farms.
Third, it was proposed that the development areas beyond the farmland
conservation district be subject to "clustercluster development"
development. This type of development means that single homes
will not be placed on larger lots in row upon row, but that new
homes be clustered more tightly, leaving more open space around
such clusters.
This three-level approach was one of the most innovative proposals
yet developed for dealing with the needs of rural preservation,
and similar protective ordinances will likely become more common
in the future.
One of the most intriguing and difficult types of preservation efforts is the preservation of historic landscapes. While buildings tend to remain relatively static in their form over time, landscapes change with each growing season. Significant historic gardens, such as George Washington's garden around Mount Vernon and, on a different scale, Central Park in New York City, should be preserved largely in their original states. The protection of scenic features, such as Niagara Falls, or historic battlefields, such as Gettysburg, have a whole different set of concerns and problems from those found with landmark buildings.
Perhaps the most common, though difficult, type of
landscape preservation project is the reconstruction of a historic
garden. Although gardens are often referred
to in writings, seldom are accurate drawings or other documentation
available. Other than for palatial structures, the tradition
of recording such drawings does not generally exist. Also, gardens
were most often in the care of gardeners or peasants, who would
have transferred their knowledge through oral apprenticeship traditions
rather than on paper.
Heritage interpretation is a term increasingly being used to represent a new approach to preservation; it encourages travelers to appreciate heritage sites and local cultures in new and richer ways. Arthur Frommer, who has written many traditional books on travel, has recognized the need for this more multidimensional approach.
After 30 years of writing standard guidebooks, I began to see that most of the vacation journeys undertaken by Americans were trivial and bland, devoid of important content, cheaply commercial, and unworthy of our better instincts and ideals....
Those travels, for most Americans, consist almost entirely of "sight-seeing"-an activity as vapid as the words imply. We rove the world, in most cases, to look at lifeless physical structures of the sort already familiar from a thousand picture books and films. We gaze at the Eiffel Tower or the Golden Gate Bridge, enjoy a brief thrill of recognition, return home, and think we have traveled.
Heritage interpretation draws together formerly separated activities from historic preservation, tourism, and the "experience industries." In this way, it interprets local culture and history and makes it accessible to the public by providing interesting interpretative experiences for visitors and tourists. The growth in this type of alternative tourism is an indicator that people have a sincere interest in understanding the true culture of places, rather than the sameness of tourism experiences of the past. Examples of these activities include the following:
On the Amtrak train between Ballup and Albuquerque, New MexicoAlbuquerque, New Mexico, a native Navajo interprets Native AmericanNative Americans culture, religion, history, and geology to Amtrak passengers as they pass through this magic landscape.
In Fort Myers, FloridaFort Myers, Florida the former winter home of Thomas EdisonEdison, Thomas, a "surprise hitchhiker" meets and boards motor coach tours. The hitchhiker is a living portrayal of Thomas Edison; the living history is accomplished by a local amateur actor.
In IndiaIndia, the U.S. National Park ServiceNational Park Service is aiding the Indian government in the development of a national cultural park near the Taj MahalTaj Mahal, as a first step toward India's development of tourism at its major heritage sites.
In the best presentation of a cultural heritage, local cultures themselves play a more active role in determining what activities are appropriate, with either outright control of the programs, or an equal voice in their planning. "The use of heritage should be as a conservation tool; it should not be exploitative or demeaning of the residents. Indigenous planners and participants can serve as the custodians of their culture, presenting authentic 'heritage experiences' to guests, and training their youth to pridefully carry on these interpretive programs in the future."
One additional outgrowth of heritage interpretation is the recognition that the natural and cultural stories of a community should be interpreted not only for visitors, but also for natives, who often have little knowledge of their own heritage. In communities like Rochester, New YorkRochester, New York and Honolulu, HawaiiHonolulu, Hawaii, community interpretation plans have been used as tools for heightening a community's awareness of its own local resources. Such cultural "story-telling" is a process "as old as time, and is just as much the province of emotionally-invested and knowledgeable local residents as it is the province of trained professionals."