Accessibility to historic and listed public buildings : the development control process in England and Wales

In this policy-relevant thesis, the findings also revealed implications in conservation practice. Conservation importance takes precedence over the importance of Accessibility in the regulative framework of development control process, although Accessibility is placed with some importance. This is the main result of the findings from a triangulated study using a Single Case study to validate the findings obtained from the Survey Method using Interviews and Delphi Method conducted on the mechanisms of development processes on the Development Control Process in England and Wales.Accessibility to Historic and Listed Public Buildings involves the practice of conservation, which is accommodating the needs of disabled people to access and use of the facilities provided in historical premises. The implications also include aspects of design, management and operations of the historic building and its services. My study took into account the Accessibility and Inclusive Design development in the United Kingdom since the start of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 until 2005 when the data collection stage was completed. This was when governmental initiatives to include disabled people in mainstream public activities were implemented by the adoption of the Social Model of Disability in U.K. government policies, the establishment of the rights based legislation and the creation of influential financial support for the active reusing of historic buildings by including access plans in applications for the Heritage Lottery Fund.Concurrently, the efforts in adding the value of accessibility to existing historic buildings in many urban regenerated areas in England and Wales involved the stakeholders, local government, the client and their representatives to the development process including heritage service providers. The research aim of my thesis is to ascertain whether the mechanisms used in the development control process and the non development control process were able to contribute in achieving accessibility to historic public buildings in England and Wales