Browsing by Subject "historic preservation"
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Item Historic preservation and heritage tourism in Texas: an integrated approach to sustainable heritage management(2009-05-15) Al Rabady, Rama IbrahimThis study assesses the efforts of the State Historic Preservation Office in relating Historic Preservation (HP) with Heritage Tourism (HT) against principles of sustainability. It also seeks to contribute toward an integrated heritage management framework at the State Historic Preservation level that is based on theoretical principles and empirical study. The focus is on the heritage management practices as performed by the Texas Historical Commission (THC). This case offers good understanding about the relationship between two major interests involved in heritage management: HP and HT. It is used to conduct a constructive evaluation of the HP-HT relationship in terms of its ?existence? and ?effectiveness? guided by sustainability and good governance principles. The study uses qualitative research based on a constructivist paradigm. Data are gathered using three research methods: documents, in-depth interviews, and participant observation. Documents were collected about the THC?s heritage management programs, including: the Texas Heritage Trails Program and the Visionaries in Preservation program. Ten in-depth interviews were conducted with state and regional stakeholders involved in activities related to these programs. Observation was made for the visionary process in Nacogdoches, Texas. Coding and categorizing for the interviews and documentary evidences were used as the fundamental analytic process. Coding included open coding, selective coding for core categories, and development of patterns and themes. This process assisted in identifying categories, properties, themes and the relationships between them that eventually helped in building a cohesive understanding of the HP-HT relationship as performed by the THC. The research found that heritage management efforts of the THC are not consistent with sustainability and good governance principles. Effectiveness of these efforts is affected by factors of heritage management approaches, partnership building, capacity building attempts, strategic processes, authority devolution, and accountability relations. A new framework for integrated heritage management has been developed from this study to assist the state government in achieving not only good management but good governance, since it will guide the organizations to more closely align with the social and cultural realities of their communities and develop meaningful and responsive heritage management policies and strategies.Item Inspection of Historic Steel Bridges Using Ultrasonic Phased Array(2014-01-16) Roldan Arcos, Alejandra LThe use of ultrasonic phased array (UPA) technology for inspection of the trunnion bearing pin of the 100-year old Salmon Bay Bascule Bridge is the focus of this research. To thoroughly investigate the bearing pin, two main objectives are addressed: the development of a UPA system, including the design of a case that uses a Poly Methyl Meth Acrylate (PMMA) material to house the transducer, and the implementation of the system in the field to test the feasibility of the UPA system and its application as a nondestructive testing unit. Two different testing settings are carried out in this research. The first study is performed in a lab-based setting on a mock-up model pin. This model is used as a reference to provide the calibration of the UPA system using the exterior edge, two keyholes, and three diagonal interior grease holes. The second study is performed in a field-based setting on the authentic trunnion bearing pin taken out of service from the Salmon Bay Bridge in Seattle, Washington, currently residing at the Riverside Campus. This pin has three similar diagonal holes, keyholes, and unknown internal defects. Realtime measurements using the UPA system is used to identify the exterior surfaces and the keyholes of the original pin. The results of the inspection of the pins using the UPA system indicate the accuracy of the real-time data taken from the probe measurements. It was limited to seeing perpendicular defects and exterior sides, and could not identify the diagonal grease hole within both pin parts. It did, however, identify the keyholes, and was later verified by visual inspection once the sleeves were removed. The original pin showed no internal defects. For future research in nondestructive testing used in historic trunnion pins, it is recommended to combine this technology with an automatic system that allows the reduction of human interaction with the inspection. A membrane-like surface adaptable to rough faces, along with a constant flow of water between the wedge and surface, would facilitate the need to remove the PMMA case out of the pin to re-apply couplant for inspections. Finally, a modified angled wedge could also be applied within the PMMA case to search for different angled cracking.Item The Littlefield Home adaptive reuse and new addition for the UT Development office(2013-05) Kim, Sujin; Holleran, Michael; Doll, Larry A. (Larry Alan)For my Master’s Design Study, I worked on adaptive reuse and a new addition for the Littlefield Home, a late-nineteenthcentury- Victorian-style residence, on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin. Like other historic buildings in briskly changing urban environments, this historic site needs some help to become a more useful campus property with no damage on its architectural character. The biggest challenge of this project was how a contemporary addition could be “compatible” but “differentiated” with the older buildings and site, following the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation. This design topic has often been controversial, and architects have frequently been confused about their responsibility. My project shows advanced criteria for architects who work on architectural heritages and is closely associated with a topic of contemporary historic preservation: balancing change, preservation, and development. The Littlefield Home and new addition will create a better working environment for the UT Development Office and ensure the long-term preservation of the historic property. My Littlefield Home project will show a technical and aesthetical collaboration of contemporary architecture with historic properties.Item Place-Based Online Management Systems for Documenting the Built Environment(2014-03-13) Conrad, Josh; University of Texas at AustinIn the fields of Cultural Resource Management and Historic Preservation, practitioners have a unique task: document, analyze, and determine the relative historical significance of places and other immovable objects in the built environment. In the age of digital documentation, these fields desperately desire – yet have had little progress in developing – sophisticated spatial database systems that offer a flexible tablet-based interface for surveying in the field everything from Victorian mansions to steel trestle bridges to 20-acre cemeteries to freestanding roadside neon signage. Such a system also requires integrated data analysis tools for conducting complex spatial queries, compiling project-specific displays of data on the fly, and exporting deliverable data to clients in formats ranging from printed inventories to database-agnostic tabulated flat files to proprietary formats specific to popular geographic information system software. For the past several years, I have been working with the University of Texas' Graduate Program in Historic Preservation, in collaboration with the UT School of Information and the City of Austin, to design and develop the Austin Historical Survey Wiki, a place-based online data management application for collecting and organizing information about the history of Austin's built environment. This application aims to resurrect the extensive amount of dead archived data from past survey efforts and combine it with new efforts from the community of neighborhood historians eager to document and share the histories of the places that matter to them. In addition, I am concurrently developing, with Austin-based architectural historians Hardy Heck Moore, Inc., a tablet-based web app that can allow everyone from professional historians to motivated neighbors to easily collect and view information, photos and scanned documents about the historic places in their own towns. Utilizing open source database software including Drupal CMS, MySQL and PostGreSQL + PostGIS, hosted on Ubuntu/Linux cloud-based servers, this application offers an interesting case study of when to design highly-flexible database schemas that can integrate with spatial data and satisfy a demanding range of data input and output requirements. Together, these two projects are tackling the core need in my field for a trade-specific, low-cost, fully integrated database system flexible enough to manage practically any type of immovable place-based heritage.Item Towards a culture of sustainable preservation : sustainable design, historic preservation, and cultures of building(2009-05) Kleon, Meghan F.; Moore, Steven A., 1945-; Holleran, MichaelThe growing sustainable design movement in the United States focuses almost exclusively on the construction of new buildings, largely ignoring the existing and historic building stock that constitutes the majority of our built environment. Historic preservation, a discipline that deals exclusively with the existing building stock and puts an emphasis on long-term management of the built environment, would seem to be an ideal partner for the sustainable design movement as it begins to address existing buildings. The practice and goals of the two fields, however, are currently perceived to be in opposition to one another by the building community and the general public. This thesis argues that sustainable design and historic preservation represent two unique and distinctive building subcultures – distinct subsets of the larger building culture of which they are a part, and that the opposition between the two disciplines stems from not only their historically distinct discourses, but also from cultural and ideological conflicts between the two fields. Different languages, code typologies, cultural identities, and conflicting attitudes toward the use of technology in contemporary building practice all stand as barriers to a significant partnership between the two disciplines. This thesis explores the cultures of sustainable design and of historic preservation in order to provide a view for practitioners in both fields into the culture of the other, and ultimately proposes a path towards developing shared cultural understandings by placing a new emphasis in both fields on social sustainability.Item Wireless Sensor Network for Monitoring of Historic Structures under Rehabilitation(2012-02-14) Samuels, Julie MarieThe use of a wireless sensor network (WSN) to monitor an historic structure under rehabilitation is the focus of this research. To thoroughly investigate the issue, two main objectives are addressed: the development of a reliable WSN tailored for use in historic structures, and the implementation of the monitoring system in the field to test the feasibility of the WSN and its applicability for structural health monitoring (SHM). Three field studies are undertaken in this research. The Frankford Church, an historic wooden church which required foundation replacement, is the first field study. Sensors monitor tilt of the church?s walls throughout construction. During the construction process, the entire floor of the church is removed and the tree stump foundations are replaced by concrete masonry unit (CMU) blocks and steel pedestals. The tilt in the walls is correlated to the construction process. St. Paul Lutheran, an historic masonry church with timber-framed roof, constitutes the second field study. In this structure, the foundations along the exterior walls are underpinned and the floors are removed and replaced with a floating concrete slab. Detected movements are also correlated to the construction efforts. The Johanniskirche, an historic masonry church with moisture problems, is the final field study case. Real-time and past measured WSN climate data is used to determine the most appropriate solution for the humid climate and resulting condensation problems in this structure. From these results, a moisture migration risk analysis protocol is created for use with a WSN to address condensation issues. The results of the tilt monitoring indicate that the approach is realistic to monitor tilt in the walls of historic structures. For future research, it is recommended to implement motes with higher tilt sensitivity. Also, further development of energy saving algorithms and energy harvesting methods will improve the WSN?s performance. Climate monitoring results show it is feasible to monitor climate conditions of historic structures. The moisture migration protocol provides a basis for further improvement. Implementation of this tool will help predict condensation events and prevent future damage to the historic structure.