The stairwell - The boarder between public and private interest: A study of the legal protection of cultural values in ”half public” interior environments

In Sweden, interior cultural values are less legally protected then exterior values. In municipal urban planning, public interests are weighed against private interest. Some spaces are hard to define as a public interest or a private interest, for example stairwells in apartment buildings. Spaces like this is neither public nor private. This can result in a difficulty to determine what kind of legal protection this kind of space is entitled to. The purpose of this study is to explore what kinds of legal protection stairwells in apartment buildings in Gothenburg have. The purpose is furthermore to investigate if there are any specific factors that affect the possibilities to legally protect these spaces. The goal with the study is to strengthen the legal protection for stairwells in apartment buildings and in that way leave them better preserved for future generations. The method that is used is a study of enactments, documents regarding urban planning in Gothenburg and qualitative interviews. The result describes in which ways interiors in Gothenburg are protected and identifies three main factors that complicate the legal protection of stairwells in apartment buildings in Gothenburg. These factors are the absence of detailed development plans, a weaker protection for interiors than exteriors in the Planning and Building Act and lastly the vagueness of the cultural environment program for Gothenburg. The conclusion of the study shows that these three factors are interacting with each other. It’s the combination between the absence of detailed development plans and the way the law is designed to protect interiors, that together creates a problem. If all apartment building would be covered by detailed development plans, the problem would be solved, but that takes time and resources. Furthermore, it would be problematic if the law had stricter requirements because that would entail a demand of a more detailed cultural environment program. To improve the legal protection of the interior values in stairwells in apartment buildings, recourses are needed. In the end, it becomes a matter of priorities.Uppsats för avläggande av filosofie kandidatexamen med huvudområdet kulturvård med inriktning mot bebyggelseantikvarisk verksamhet 2020, 180 hp Grundnivå 2020:1