Spatial Mapping of ‘People–Place Ties’ as an Integral Part of Heritage Management Process

Abstract

Cultural manifestations of communities imbue deep-rooted meanings to places and establish intricate webs of relationships between people and places. These relationships cohesively add to the unique heritage of any place. In this era of urbanization, these webs are getting ruptured to make way for a globalized, homogenized and incoherent built environment leading to the loss of meanings, associations and identities. With the increasing recognition for the need of a holistic heritage management in both national and global platforms, a probe towards formulating a framework for such interventions becomes extremely essential today. This article signifies the role of spatial mapping of ‘people–place ties’ in the heritage management process. The methodology of documenting community–place relationships, mapping and interpreting maps to form a basis for interventions is demonstrated by taking the case of Puri, India. A number of research methods such as mental maps, essays and precoded questionnaire surveys have been used. To visualize this qualitative aspect, choropleth maps have been generated with the help of Geographic Information System (GIS) to be compared for residents of various age groups to interpret built environment qualities which need to be conserved/intervened. Thus, this process could be a part of a framework designed to sensitively intervene in rapidly transforming morphologies of heritage cities and help in sustaining and reinforcing their ‘place identity’.