Technological Advancements in Historic Preservation - Research Paper Example

Download file to see previous pages Historic buildings have been designed with sustainable features that respond to both site and prevailing climate (WBDG). The effectiveness of sustainable features used to preserve traditional buildings and, when incorporated in modern buildings, those features can result in substantial energy savings. The current technologically improved sustainable preservation of buildings has, therefore, been derived and adapted to supplement the inherent sustainable features in many historical buildings without compromising the unique and historic character of such buildings. For example, the Adobe houses or those made of dried bricks are among the oldest buildings made of the most common materials that are known to man today (Old House Web). The adobe bricks were not fired initially but were sun-baked first and only then used in the construction process. These bricks consist of sand, clay, water, gravel and straw or grass that are mixed with hands in wooden moulds and then are being dried in the sun (Old House Web). As the adobe bricks are not fired in a kiln, the bricks never harden permanently but remain unstable during their life time. These bricks are, therefore, prone to shrinking as water content changes with their strength fluctuating over time: the higher the water content, the lower the strength (Old House Web). The adobe bricks, though having been successfully used in the buildings, cannot bond to metal, wood or stone as they exhibit greater movements than these materials. Attempts to bond these materials resulted in cracking, separating or twisting at the interfaces, which led to cracking and failure of the buildings in most of cases. This prejudiced the preservation of these buildings. In the majority of cases, where traditional methods may not present enough strength in buildings, other technologies in the modern building construction are used to reinforce these traditional buildings to ensure sustainability and preservation of a historic fabric (Fischetti, 42). The early adobe building foundations varied greatly according to their differences in local building construction and available materials, which resulted in great variability in these buildings, including their sustainability (Old House Web). Lack of professionals at planning or preservation stage of a huge number of traditional buildings has had a bad effect on those buildings, thus, numerous efforts to innovate and elaborate plans for preservation in these buildings have been made recently; though there has been a growing belief in the inclusion of planning and growth management in preservation of these buildings (WBDG). Though preserving a building has been recognized as an ultimate recycling of projects, the majority of preservationists in most of cases fight the stigma of historic buildings being inefficient and stress on the need to take daunting corrective measures in order to retrofit for energy saving devices and systems with the green sustainable design being increasingly popular in both construction and preservation of new industries (WBDG). These shortcomings in the traditional buildings and preservation approaches are continuously being reviewed though the improved technologies in both preservation of buildings and documentation of building projects so that to enhance effective preservation. The growing technological advances have made it possible to improve building preservation efficiency and accuracy with record keeping in architectural and construction projects being enhanced to ...Download file to see next pagesRead More