Mobility and accessibility in historical city quarters

Historic city quarters are parts of the city with a valuable architectural fund, formed upon an urban matrix that dates long before the appearance of automobiles. A variety of content, the history and value of the constructed elements make them highly appealing, attracting both tourists and other residents of the city. Managing mobility and ensuring accessibility may be the greatest challenges faced by the historical neighborhoods. The quality of traffic solutions has a major impact on the physical, economic, social and environmental elements that certainly act as the crucial aspects for a historical area's 'well-being'. The ever growing awareness of urban heritage as a non-renewable resource, whose conservation contributes in strengthening the identity and preserving the collective memory of a society, encouraged the development of strategies based on sustainable development principles that seek to adapt the traffic conditions to the existing street zoning, rather than vice-versa. A range of traffic management techniques have been developed in the historical city quarters parts in order to provide an alternative for cars, improve the public safety and enhance the urban environment. Starting from a perspective that no traffic exclusion measures should be viewed in isolation in order to maintain the vivaciousness of these historical areas, the article presents an overview of certain traffic solutions for managing mobility in historical neighborhoods, with the aim of highlighting both the positive and negative impact of traffic, as well as the guidelines to be considered in the process of planning and design