ADAPTIVE REUSE OF THE URBAN BUILT ENVIRONMENT AND DESIGN INTERVENTION STRATEGIES

Abstract

According to the World Cities Report 2020, global urbanization will continue to grow over the next ten years. At the same time, large cities are beginning to counter urbanization because of the continuous development of traffic conditions, the Internet, and other information technologies, which have created conditions for the migration and flow of population. The same thing is happening in the big eastern cities in China. On the one hand, the city needs to continue to expand; on the other hand, the original urban center is declining at the start. These pose severe challenges to Chinese cities regarding housing, infrastructure, and basic services. Today, numerous cities worldwide are attempting to transform into sustainable urban development to deal with urbanization, re-urbanization, and climate change. In this article, the term “adaptive reuse” is used as a research object to look for intervention methods to improve the built environment with unique social values and spatial characteristics. Firstly, The theoretical development process of adaptive reuse is chronologically organized. The built environment is divided into three categories: heritage buildings, existing buildings, and urban regeneration, to formulate the theoretical construction of adaptive reuse independently for each type. Second, we integrate prior researchers’ classifications of the built environment and intervention strategies with prominent cases of adaptive reuse in Europe and China. As a result, the three intervention strategies of this study and their respective designed intervention methods are outlined. In addition, each technique is followed by a matching practical case.