MANAGING CANAL CULTURAL HERITAGE IN DECLINED CITIES

The Grand Canal My case study for this research is the Grand Canal in China. The concept of “the Grand Canal” is a proper term for declaring the World Heritage List (WHL) and it is the general name of the three canals. The first is the Suitang Canal centred in Luoyang, extending north to Zhuojun and south to Hangzhou, the second is the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal from Beijing to Hangzhou and the third is the Zhedong Canal from Hangzhou to Ningbo. The Grand Canal was first built in 486 BC and with a total length of 3200 kilometres, is the earliest and longest canal in the world. Since it was been built it has been an important channel and channel for political and economic communication between North and South China. Due to the Grand Canal connecting the north with the south of China, the prosperity of zones along the canal depended historically largely on trade and commodity circulation via the canal infrastructure.

However, water transportation has been replaced to a certain extent by modern, land-based transportation such as railways since the 20th century, which has served to weaken the political and economic status of canal cities. Since then, the economy and development of many canal cities have encountered difficulties. For prioritising socio-economic development, local governments often exploit the natural and cultural heritage excessively thus resulting in secondary destruction of cultural properties, such as environmental pollution, the damage of "integrity" and the "same image of the cities". As a representative of worldwide canals, the Grand Canal and its cultural landscape need to be sustainably protected to maintain the continuity of both heritage and local communities. In line with this, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH) has issued the Recommendation for the Protection and Management of the Grand Canal, and the Executive Committee for the Protection and Management of the Grand Canal was also set up to hold a regular meeting every year to update details and information of cities along the Grand Canal.

The protection of this World Heritage property is included in the Chinese "Fourteenth Five-Year Plan", and the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) aims to achieve the urban sustainability of historic towns along the Grand Canal. The major question this raises is how to protect and manage the Grand Canal for the future. The HUL Approach recognises urban areas as the outcome of a historic layering of natural and cultural values and attributes, including the broader urban context and its geographical setting. It encourages an integration of social and economic development and urban heritage conservation, which lays the foundation for a comprehensive method for the identification, assessment, conservation and management of urban landscapes within the framework of overall sustainable development.

Six critical steps are recommended in the HUL Approach, which can be simplified as mapping resources, reaching consensus, assessing vulnerability, integrating, prioritising actions, and establishing local partnerships. The HUL Approach combines cultural heritage with a broader urban context, and conservation is included at the urban level, so it is very suitable for canal heritage management.