Conference Paper

Author

Spratt, Peter

Title

The engineers heritage charter - a discussion paper

In

From the Past to the Future: 18th Australian Engineering Heritage Conference 2015 [Newcastle]

Imprint

Engineers Australia, Barton, Australian Capital Territory, 2015, pp. 172-180

ISBN/ISSN

9781922107435

Url

https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/informit.697100851127509

Abstract

Engineering is wide ranging. It includes bridges, machines, dams, buildings, energy, industrial processes, communications and computers. The recording and assessment of the significance of the various items is important to enable the present generation to build upon the knowledge of the past and to have their contributions passed onto future generations. This linking of past, present and future enables the progressive development of ideas and the artefacts resulting from them.

Engineering is all about ideas with practical uses for the community - their creation, their continuing development and the turning of the end results into an artefact used and valued by the community. Many of the results are major advances in community wellbeing and are milestones in the development of our civilization.

Artefacts can be touched and are tangible outcomes of ideas which cannot be touched and which are intangible. Much of engineering is intangible with industrial processes, computer technology and energy being prime examples.

Heritage has largely been linked up to the present time with Buildings and much work has been done by National Trusts, by Heritage Authorities, by Architects and Archaeologists. Their common interest has been developed in Australia as the Burra Charter. It is the preeminent and widely used Heritage Document with regard to buildings and is derived from the work of ICOMOS, the International Committee on Monuments and Sites. The Burra Charter has concentrated on the place and the conservation of that place, and its principles are not readily useable for artefacts that do not involve places or intangibles.

An overarching Heritage Charter, capable of dealing with all artefacts, and of handling both tangible and intangibles, is needed.

Tangible heritage such as buildings, structures, fixed machines, moveable machines, water supply sewerage, etc. and intangible heritage such as industrial processes, energy, computer and communication technology etc. are dealt with by assessing the tangible outcomes through the ideas behind them. Principles of conservation are included to cover all aspects.

Related Published resources

isPartOf

• From the Past to the Future: 18th Australian Engineering Heritage Conference 2015 [Newcastle] (Barton, Australian Capital Territory: Engineers Australia, 2015), 230 pp, https://search.informit.org/doi/book/10.3316/informit.9781922107435. Details