Management Of Historical Buildings Research Articles

Intelligent Monitoring System for Integrated Management of Historical Buildings

This study demonstrates the effectiveness of a multi-method approach for the restoration of a historic building (train station) in Poland. The project employed field investigations, laboratory analyses, and close-range photogrammetry to create a Historic Building Information Model (HBIM). This comprehensive data set informed the development of targeted conservation strategies that addressed the station’s specific needs while respecting its historical significance. Interventions prioritized the use of locally sourced and sustainable materials, minimized the visual impact on the exterior, and achieved net-zero emissions through improvements to the building envelope and a switch to a heat pump heating system. Additionally, an intelligent monitoring system was implemented to continuously collect data on environmental conditions and structural displacement. These data will be used to develop a predictive model for future maintenance needs, allowing for a preventative approach to conservation and minimizing resource consumption. Overall, this project serves as a model for integrating advanced technologies in historical building conservation, promoting sustainable practices, and ensuring the longevity of irreplaceable cultural landmarks. The key findings derived from this approach encompass a comprehensive assessment of the station’s condition, optimized conservation strategies, insights from HBIM modeling, and the ongoing benefits of the intelligent monitoring system. Field investigations revealed several areas of concern, such as structural cracks, material deterioration, moisture infiltration, and significant heat loss through the building envelope. This information was crucial for developing targeted conservation strategies. The use of internal thermal insulation systems, particularly capillary active mineral blocks, significantly improved thermal performance. Moisture management interventions, including the restoration of the rainwater drainage system and the application of moisture-proof insulation, reduced reliance on the municipal water supply. The intelligent monitoring system, with sensors measuring temperature, humidity, and structural displacement, plays a crucial role in ongoing conservation efforts. This system allows for continuous monitoring and the development of predictive models, ensuring targeted and preventative maintenance, reducing resource consumption, and extending the lifespan of the building.

The Importance of Using BIM in Documenting Historical Buildings in Syria after The Earthquake – Case study (Department of Immigration -Old City of Aleppo)

Syrian cities and historic sites have suffered severe destruction due to armed conflicts in the past decade, causing significant effects on ancient civilizations. Historic buildings are exposed to dynamic changes like environmental shifts facing challenges especially after the earthquake disaster on February 6, 2023.Many historical buildings were partially or entirely destroyed; therefore, it needs proper restoration, maintenance, and management. Many practitioners in historical building management encounter challenges during the restoration process, including inefficient project management, and project delays. These issues stem from the absence of digital documentation and the updating of information management systems. Historical buildings management still relies on traditional techniques, managing information through various coordination systems by different professionals, leading to a lack of cooperation, and interoperability. This research aims to present BIM as a supportive tool to address these issues. It explores current technologies and their roles in digitization within BIM providing a detailed Historical Building Information Modeling (HBIM) and develops a new integrated HBIM framework for the management of historical buildings in an integrated and interoperable environment that supports 3D digital documentation to maintain a heritage asset and facility management activities. The results indicate that the proposed framework is feasible and effective in achieving information integration and communication among stakeholders.

DIFFERENT DATA JOINING AS A BASIC MODEL FOR HBIM – A CASE PROJECT ST. PATALEIMON IN SKOPJE

Abstract. H-BIM (Heritage Building Information Modelling) is principle and system of use of historic buildings that can be used for the management, reconstruction or renovation and restoration of monuments. It is a set of geometric and descriptive information about a building. In the last decade, several historical objects were documented using modern methods, mainly advanced photogrammetrical and laser technologies, for a wide range of users to get benefits from economically, safety, presentation, and life cycle management of historical buildings. The rapid development in geomatics is possible thanks to advanced technologies of data capturing, sufficient capacity of computer technology and transmission and information networks. The most used technologies are terrestrial laser scanning (TLS), personal laser scanning (PLS) or mobile mapping systems (MMS), terrestrial or aerial drone based close-range digital photogrammetry (using SfM – structure from motion technology and MVS – multi view stereo). Today’s modern advanced technologies allow geometrical and textural data collection within a few centimetres’ accuracy outside and inside infrastructure by various methods of PLS, photogrammetrical SfM and TLS. In terms of object visualisation, VR or AR (virtual or augmented reality) technology is proving to be suitable. The following text discusses the use of geomatics technologies for the creation of H-BIM on the example of a cultural monument in Skopje, North Macedonia, including visualization in virtual reality (VR).

Architectural Heritage Indoor Comfort after Retrofit Works: The Case Study of S. Vito Church in L’Aquila, Italy

The performance redevelopment of Architectural Heritage is a current research topic, in particular for the impact on energy saving and, consequently, on the comfort management of historical buildings. In order to evaluate the energy performance of the built environment and to optimize it in the retrofit, the way of using the heritage structures is fundamental. In particular, the retrofit in religious buildings through the installation of a new heating system often modifies the original microclimate of the internal environment without guaranteeing adequate comfort conditions, due to the peculiarities of these artifacts way of use and to their geometric and construction features. This contribution illustrates analysis on the internal comfort of a church after the retrofit intervention, which has shown energetic and comfort critical issues in relation to the discontinuous use type of the structure. The results of the analysis on the case-study, the church of San Vito in L’Aquila, have shown that the use of systems that exploit the thermal mass is not always sustainable and that it is before essential to in-depth investigate the fruition mode of the environments in order to identify suitable retrofit strategies.

The Analysis of the Maintained/Disowned Relationship among Firmitas, Utilitas, and Venustas to Preserve the Cultural Heritage: An H-BIM Approach for the Management of Historic Buildings

Understanding the transformations of a historic building is a complex but necessary operation to plan future, more aware maintenance works that preserve the architectural quality. This study proposed to analyze the changes undergone by an edifice over time by virtue of the Vitruvian triad, namely the criteria formalised by Vitruvius to judge architecture: firmitas (construction system), utilitas (utility), and venustas (aesthetics). These criteria depend on the designer’s mindset but also the influence of historical, cultural, or local factors. The theme required a prior reflection on the mutations of the Vitruvian triad over time. Based upon these relationships, the analysis of the architectural heritage of Messina was started because it is emblematic due to historical events: buildings constructed after the earthquake of 1908, subject to war damage repairs, and then maintenance. Their firmitas, utilitas, and venustas changed for historical, cultural, social, and normative reasons. In this regard, the former Fascist House has significant features: the repeated changes in intended use that produced planimetric variations, technical-constructive modifications sometimes connected to formal choices, and to the abolition, albeit partial, of fascist symbols. The current appeal to experiment with digital technologies has led to examination of the opportunities of the BIM methodology, finding in the model historicisation a way to document and record the triad variations of an existing building in the virtual environment. The research topic proposes an operative approach for more incisive analysis and digitalisation of historical buildings, trying to make a contribution to Target 4 of Goal 11 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development: to strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard cultural heritage.

HBIM: The digital transformation of cultural and existing heritage

BIM, or Building Information Modelling, is the future of architecture, engineering, construction and operations. We very often associate this definition with new buildings, while 80% of buildings in 2050 already exist today. A significant part of them are historical buildings. It is important to know how we can use BIM in this context and how this modern design tool serves to model and manage the unpredictable situations and complexities of historic buildings. The dissimilarity, the difficulty of data exchange between interested parties and therefore the difficulty of standardization is in this regard the challenge to be overcome with older buildings. In connection with architectural heritage, information modelling of heritage buildings is referred to under the name of HBIM, which is a built architecture representation system composed of libraries of semantically structured and parameterized objects. The basic process is the processing of the data in our possession, which are all transferred to a BIM-type model. SCAN to BIM is an operation that allows you to connect a point cloud created by laser scanner or photogrammetry to develop historical building management models that can be used in different application areas: accessibility and improvement, archival documentation research, conservation and visualization of cultural heritage, reconstruction and management of heritage, artificial intelligence (AI) and virtual reality (VR).The purpose of the paper is to provide an basic overview of the concept of HBIM. The contribution provides a brief overview of the regulatory framework and an overview of the methodology and workflow in the mentioned area with the appropriate conclusions.

Using Building Information Modelling to map the composition of glass panes in a historic house

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is widely regarded to be potentially useful for the conservation and management of historic buildings. So far, research in this area has mostly concentrated in geometry: surveying, the parametric modelling of building features and the accurate modelling of complex building shapes. But in order to be fully integrated with conservation practice, Building Information Models need to include other types of data. This paper demonstrates a method to introduce and visualise spatially resolved data within a Building Information Model of a historic building. It focuses on the visualisation of the composition of historic glass and the metadata associated with this measurement. The conclusions are, however, extensible to any type of spatially-resolved material information that can inform building management, conservation and interpretation. The software Dynamo is used to add this functionality to a Revit 3D model. The modelling stage requires the creation of shape families for different types of window. This approach is compared with a similar visualisation produced with ArcGIS, a common Geographic Information System (GIS) software. The Dynamo algorithm successfully adds the visualisation capacity to the BIM model, but it is unlikely that this level of customisation is achievable by the average user. There is a need for further development of technological solutions that combine the visualisation capacity of GIS with ability of BIM to link 3D models and numerical data.

Dissemination, assessment and management of historic buildings by thematic virtual tours and 3D models

The digitalization of the historical-architectural heritage for virtual reality (VR) applications is crucial within the contemporary scientific and technical debate for several aspects. In fact, beyond the exploration for education and entertainment purposes, the employment of three-dimensional (3D) reality-based and computer-based models and environments seems to be very promising for performance assessment and risk management as well. Particularly, in order to develop and validate smart, low-cost and user-friendly tools, which might apply even in cases of limited time and budget, the present paper is going to propose a methodological workflow based on thematic virtual tours of 360° scenes, which integrate a variety of informative contents and digital products as external hotspots/switches. The VR tours, where 3D models might play a key role for an accurate representation of relevant parts and/or analytical elaboration of further data, are conceived as flexible and scalable solutions, supporting users, technicians and authorities through remote access, diagnosis of the state of conservation and communication of safety measures. The application of the proposed methods and techniques to a representative case study, the Norman-Swabian Castle of Gioia del Colle (Ba), South Italy, is presented in order to illustrate the achievable results and highlight the benefit of innovative “digital” solutions for data collection, storage and communication, compared to the traditional “analogical” practices. In detail, a Web-GIS platform, developed within a previous research project, is integrated with direct links to three thematic virtual tours that provide added contents for inclusive dissemination (timeline schemes, aerial views, 3D sculptural and architectural details), performance assessment (diagnostic reports, decay maps, 3D reconstructions of technical components) and risk management (exit signs, help instructions, warnings). Thus, the VR tours, while documenting realistically the state of the site, might act as host environments of digital products, at increasing complexity, all displayed according to an intuitive and accessible communication approach.Highlights:• Virtual tours of 360° scenes, linking thematic digital contents, are proposed as intuitive and versatile tools for smart documentation, conservation and protection of historical buildings.• The role of 3D reality-based and computer-based models is discussed toward their integration and correlation within thematic virtual tours of 360° scenes.• The potential of immersive environments for sharing knowledge about conservation issues and training users on safety measures in historic buildings is underlined.

Investigating the constraints for managing the protection of historic buildings in remote areas of Saudi Arabia: a DEMATEL modelling approach

PurposeThe paper is aimed at identifying, analysing and prioritizing the critical constraints affecting efficient management of historic buildings in remote areas of Saudi Arabia.Design/methodology/approachThematic content analysis and expert-based evaluation approaches were used to identify and evaluate the constraints. The DEMATEL technique was deployed to define the interrelationship complexities between the constraints and evaluate the impact of these interrelationships to ascertain the influential constraints.FindingsThe results identify “lack of clearly defined roles for the multiple government agencies” as the most influential constraint for managing historic sites and buildings in remote areas of Saudi Arabia.Research limitations/implicationsThe contextual interrelationship between the constraints is due to the experts' perceptions, which may be biased due to their proficiencies and professional backgrounds. Since the evidence on which the findings of this paper are established is predominantly from experiences related to historic sites and buildings in remote areas of Saudi Arabia, the results of this paper may not be entirely applicable elsewhere.Practical implicationsThe paper provides invaluable methodology that can support practitioners and policymakers to establish sustainable strategies that can enhance the management and protection of historic buildings in remote areas of Saudi Arabia.Originality/valueThis study noticeably contributes to knowledge by providing comprehensive understanding of the major impediments to the successful management of historic buildings in remote areas of Saudi Arabia, which can assist in mitigating the potential impacts of these constraints and to advocate for the achievement of efficient management and protection of the historic sites and buildings.

Research on the application of Mobile GIS in the intelligent protection of historical buildings

Aiming at the protection and management of urban historical buildings, this paper studies the methods of historical building information management and utilization based on mobile GIS to improve the accuracy, timeliness and scientificity of historical building protection and management. This article introduces the use of mobile GIS terminals to quickly collect and manage historical building attribute information, multimedia information, historical archive information, and spatial information. It also supports 3D scene browsing, information analysis, and thematic map production. The historical architecture culture was demonstrated, and the applicability and advancedness of the method were verified through the practical experience of intelligent management of historical buildings in Guangzhou.

MANAGEMENT PROCESSES RECONSTRUCTION OF HISTORICAL BUILDINGS SUPPORTED BY SMART TECHNOLOGY – A CASE STUDY OF FUZHOU CITY

Abstract. This research is based on the projects that Fuzhou has carried out and in developing, regarding to historical building survey, registration, documentation, publication, construction, and daily management business. It integrates smart technologies such as geographic information technology and visualization technology to develop a historical building conservation management database and Fuzhou historical building conservation planning management system. The construction of Fuzhou historical building conservation planning management system, promoted the reconstruction of historical building management processes, achieved efficient and advanced administrative management, achieved scientific and intelligent conservation of historical buildings, and improved the conservation and management of Fuzhou historical buildings in the field of technology level.

RESEARCH OF FUZHOU HISTORICAL BUILDING MANAGEMENT PLATFORM BASED ON DATA WAREHOUSE TECHNOLOGY

Abstract. In order to solve the problem of "data island" in the management of Fuzhou historical buildings. This paper analyzes historical building management needs and historical building management indicators. Then the data warehouse model of historic buildings is constructed by using dimension modeling method, and a set of data warehouse of Fuzhou historic buildings is designed and established. Finally, a historical building management platform was built on the basis of the historical building data warehouse, which realized the entry, standardization, extraction and cleaning of historical building management data. It provides data support for data mining of historic buildings in order to realize the protection, activation, utilization and standardized management of Fuzhou historic buildings.

A Cloud Model-based Knowledge Mapping Method for Historic Building Maintenance based on Building Information Modelling and Ontology

The maintenance of historic buildings requires a systematic approach to construct and reuse maintenance knowledge. Maintenance knowledge of historic buildings has extensive and specific knowledge, but a small number of experts provide most of experience. With the rapid development of building information modelling (BIM), it can facilitate maintenance management of historic buildings. Recently, research on connecting ontology and BIM was discussed to promote building knowledge management (BKM). However, BKM is less applied in historic buildings and connection strength is also less discussed. Connection strength of knowledge mapping can increase the performance of knowledge retrieval. Therefore, this study aims to build connection between maintenance ontology of historic buildings and BIM, and also proposes a cloud model-based knowledge mapping method to evaluate the connection strength. This study uses FMEA (failure mode and effects analysis) to connect ontology and BIM, and the grey relational analysis to evaluate the connection strength. Meanwhile, cloud model is integrated into FMEA to better deal with uncertain information to increase the reliability. This study adopts a real case to valid the practicability. The results show the proposed method can evaluate the connection strengths with uncertain information and obtain the maintenance knowledge more efficiently.

Fire Safety of Historical Buildings: Principles and Methodological Approach

ABSTRACTThis paper addresses an issue rarely contemplated in the management of historical buildings, fire safety. There is an implication that “compliant” means “safe” and that the goals and objectives of compliance are perfectly aligned with those of fire safety. In the case of historical buildings, this is a mistake that has resulted in the loss of major historical buildings through the centuries. This paper presents a framework of analysis that uses adequate tools to evaluate and establish true performance assessment. The objective is to adequately define and implement the goal of fire safety. This paper is not a traditional research paper in that it does not describe experiments, computations or analysis. Instead, this paper proposes, through an example of application, a critical overview of problems incurred when evaluating fire safety on the basis of solutions issued from prescriptive approaches. In the process, this paper highlights the value of a comprehensive performance-based approach. A performance-based analysis emphasizes an approach to design that values the inherent features of historic buildings. This could potentially result in minimum and rational alterations that meet the goals of fire safety while also achieving other restoration objectives.

Assessment of Practicability and Barriers of Use of BIM Strategies for Efficient Management of Public Buildings

Abstract The productivity of real property depends on the efficiency of the property management technique. Building Information Modelling (BIM) is an emerging technique examined. The aim of the research is to explore the practicability of BIM for the management of public buildings (PBs) and the hindrances subject to the effective operation. The tasks of the research were to investigate the awareness level of BIM for management of PBs; to investigate the acceptance level of BIM as a property management technique; to explore the hindrances of BIM use for the management of PBs; and, to assess the suitability of BIM for management of historic buildings. Survey and descriptive methods were used in the research. One hundred and nine questionnaires were distributed and a total of seventy-eight was returned. Purposive sampling technique was used for the selection of the respondents. Stratified random sampling was used to select the public buildings, while clustered sampling was used for locations. The findings of the research showed a low level of awareness from the respondents; BIM was not in use; the acceptance of BIM was high but the hindrances were numerous. The research concluded that the use of BIM was practicable given adequate awareness and training. The research recommended a paradigm shift from the traditional property management approach to BIM strategy for the effective performance of PBs.

Development of a Web Application for Historical Building Management through BIM Technology

Nowadays the built heritage has been recognized as one of the main sectors that can support the economic and sustainable development of countries. In the last years, the built heritage has been subject to several levels of interventions, being now clear its need for a proper maintenance and conservation management. However, in several cases, the maintenance faces lack of building records, which makes the maintenance a harsh, long, and expensive process. Therefore, there is an opportunity and need to apply new technologies, like Building Information Modelling (BIM), as supporting tool to the management of historical heritage. By so, the aim of this work was the development of a management system to be used as a supporting tool to the maintenance and conservation of the existent buildings, in historical context, facilitating to the interested parties the automated and digitized information needed to carry out the most varied tasks, with the particularity to be directly connected to the 3D‐BIM model of the building. But in order to test the developed system (its applicability and functionality), it was in an early phase, applied to a pilot project with the significant heritage value. This work follows a development methodology applied to the case study and had different phases: (1) the case study was modelled in Autodesk Revit software, in whose model was inserted all the parametric information and associated metadata; (2) then, a support database of the management system was developed in Microsoft SQL Server, which will support all the information exported from the BIM model; (3) a web application was developed in C# through Visual Studio 2015, which works through and application programming interface (API) allowing the communication between the web application and the BIM model, allowing not only the interaction with the parametric information of this one, but also, a persistent access to a data management system (drawings, inspection reports, specifications, etc.) that has been created. The development of the management system and its application to the case study allows us to show its potential as a tool for the historical heritage management, contributing to its permanent and constantly updated management and cross off the fragmentation and loss of information therefore reducing the consequent investment in data collection.

The Role of Sustainable Events in the Management of Historic Buildings

As the use of historic building as venues for commercial activity grows, events management professionals working in historic buildings are faced with a number of sustainability challenges, including conservation, preservation, social value and financial sustainability, as well as with satisfying their clients. In particular, these professionals are required to maintain the complex balance between the competing priorities of historic value and contemporary relevance. Little research has thus far investigated the role that sustainable events can play in the management of historic buildings, beyond considerations of the trade-off between conservation and income generation. This research analyses the contribution that events can make to the sustainable management of historic buildings, with an emphasis on understanding the perspectives of event managers within these properties, based on qualitative interviews with historic building event managers and stakeholders in London, United Kingdom. A key finding of the research is that event managers within historic buildings have complex views of sustainability that are specific to these properties and which are not captured in the mainstream events management literature. The paper contributes to the emerging literature on sustainable events and also develops earlier research on the role of events and other income-generating activities in historic buildings.

A geographycal information system to support restoration activities: a methodological approach experienced upon the case study of Ascoli Satriano Fortress

This paper deals with the development of a geographic information system (GIS), specifically designed for the restoration process of Ascoli Satriano Fortress (an important example of military architecture in the south of Italy), using as entry data its 3D modelling obtained with a standard multi-view stereo (MVS) pipeline. The work described has been developed following a methodological approach, highlighting best practices for the management of different information and the creation of specific thematic maps, demonstrating how a close cooperation between restorers and geomatics experts can be the turnkey for the conservation process of the architectural heritage. In this research, the GIS implementation proposed for the cataloguing and the management of historical buildings serves to define the abacus of the materials and the decay analysis performed by restorers The aim is to create a link between the survey’s output and both quantitative/descriptive information, useful for managing the restoration process in all the steps of the work. The management of an historical building into an integrated system enables all the actors involved in the process to be as much faithful as possible with the real building features.

Standardizing the indoor climate in historic buildings: opportunities, challenges and ways forward

ABSTRACTStandardization for indoor climate control in historic buildings has recently taken a new direction with standards and guidelines that focus more on decision processes than outcomes. The objective of the paper is to explore and discuss how standards can evolve to both fit and guide decision processes to facilitate a sustainable management of historic buildings. Interviews with engineers and heritage professionals in the Church of Sweden in combination with indoor climate monitoring were used to understand the technical and organizational context. The results show that the development of process standards solves some of the problems related to the conventional outcome-oriented approach by opening up for a wider set of solutions. However, available guidelines are difficult to apply and integrate in the existing management of churches. A stronger focus on strategic feedback and an increased use of local guidelines are suggested.

Energy Management of Historic Buildings

The paper is focused on solving problems of design of energy management model in the context of historical buildings and monuments. The main goal of the energy management is to find solutions that preserve the historical heritage while not damaging the uniqueness of the buildings in question and their surroundings. The paper proposes a scheme of activities of energy management of historical monuments in the implementation of energy-efficient measures.