Abstract
Ancient settlements were dependent on the availability of water for sustainable living, ritual values, and economic purposes. Today, many Tropical Asian cities provide examples of urban settlements within water landscapes, yet these cities struggle with water issues, and face challenges in creating a contextual morphological identity. This paper explores urban waterfront heritage through a case study of Chittagong, Bangladesh. The city is experiencing rapid unplanned urbanisation, insensitive land use and the demolition of historical buildings along waterways, which in turn has created a contextual crisis in the built environment and social living. To explore the relationship of built heritage with the water-edge, this paper examines historical architectural styles using urban morphological codes. Results show that the historical orientations, accessibility, and functions of heritage buildings are explicitly and sensitively connected with the water-edge. The paper argues that physical and spatial components of urban structure and water landscape, incorporating the lessons of urban history, could become a tool to preserve urban heritage. However, to enhance the image of the city in a sustainable manner along water-edges, it is crucial to use the potentiality of water landscape with the heritage-based morphologies in current urban design and development practices.
Highlights
Introduction and BackgroundE arly civilisations were mostly settled near waterways and depended on the availability of water for sustainable living, ritual values, and economic advantages provided by transport and connectivity (Abshirini & Koch, 2016;; Gu, 2013;; Salim & Mohamed, 2018;; Silva et al, 2006;; Smith & Ferrari, 2012)
E arly civilisations were mostly settled near waterways and depended on the availability of water for sustainable living, ritual values, and economic advantages provided by transport and connectivity (Abshirini & Koch, 2016;; Gu, 2013;; Salim & Mohamed, 2018;; Silva et al, 2006;; Smith & Ferrari, 2012)
The UNESCO World Heritage Centre has stated that heritage conservation/preservation is of significance to every society in the contemporary era (Samsudin & Jaffar, 2017)
Summary
Introduction and BackgroundE arly civilisations were mostly settled near waterways and depended on the availability of water for sustainable living, ritual values, and economic advantages provided by transport and connectivity (Abshirini & Koch, 2016;; Gu, 2013;; Salim & Mohamed, 2018;; Silva et al, 2006;; Smith & Ferrari, 2012). The tremendous pressures of urbanisation have degraded waterfronts and their waterways, resulting in reduced water drainage capacity, increased water pollution, unpredicted waterlogging, and flash floods (Rashid et al, 2018). These phenomena have raised significant contextual challenges in identifying urban morphological patterns, which affect urban heritage conservation and/or preservation planning (Hussain et al, 2015;; Samsudin & Jaffar, 2017;; Xie & Gu, 2015). On the other side of the colonial world, in the northern temperate region of England, the port city of Liverpool was registered as a World Heritage Site in 2004 in recognition of several prominent landmark buildings along the Pier Head and Albert Dock waterfront (Liverpool City Council, 2020)
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