Historic environments and tourism: Improving access for disabled people

Historic environments and buildings are valued and valuable features of the UK tourism sector, as visitor attractions and as holiday accommodation. Keeping historic environments in economic use is crucial to their conservation, but they date from eras when access for disabled people was not a consideration. Part III of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (the DDA) took effect on 1 October 2004 and requires service providers to make reasonable building adjustments to remove physical barriers to disabled access. This independent scoping study by the College of Estate Management, sponsored by Marsh Limited and The Mercers' Company, explores progress in making historic environments accessible to disabled people through an examination of UK policy, literature and case studies in South Oxfordshire and London. The report findings are relevant for property and built environment professionals, business managers and all those involved with historic environments that are used for tourism.

Rapid assessment of historic, current and future habitat quality for biodiversity around UK Natura 2000 sites

Changes in landscape composition and structure may impact the conservation and management of protected areas. Species that depend on specific habitats are at risk of extinction when these habitats are degraded or lost. Designing robust methods to evaluate landscape composition will assist decision- and policy-making in emerging landscapes. This paper describes a rapid assessment methodology aimed at evaluating landcover quality for birds, plants, butterflies and bees around seven UK Natura 2000 sites. An expert panel assigned quality values to standard Coordination of Information on the Environment (CORINE) landcover classes for each taxonomic group. Quality was assessed based on historical (1950, 1990), current (2000) and future (2030) land-cover data, the last projected using three alternative scenarios: a growth applied strategy (GRAS), a business-as-might-beusual (BAMBU) scenario, and sustainable European development goal (SEDG) scenario. A quantitative quality index weighted the area of each land-cover parcel with a taxa-specific quality measure. Land parcels with high quality for all taxonomic groups were evaluated for temporal changes in area, size and adjacency. For all sites and taxonomic groups, the rate of deterioration of land-cover quality was greater between 1950 and 1990 than current rates or as modelled using the alternative future scenarios (2000– 2030). Model predictions indicated land-cover quality stabilized over time under the GRAS scenario, and was close to stable for the BAMBU scenario. The SEDG scenario suggested an ongoing loss of quality, though this was lower than the historical rate of c. 1% loss per decade. None of the future scenarios showed accelerated fragmentation, but rather increases in the area, adjacency and diversity of high quality land parcels in the landscape.

Tests of sunspot number sequences: 3. Effects of regression procedures on the calibration of historic sunspot data

We use sunspot group observations from the Royal Greenwich Observatory (RGO) to investigate the effects of intercalibrating data from observers with different visual acuities. The tests are made by counting the number of groups RB above a variable cut-off threshold of observed total whole-spot area (uncorrected for foreshortening) to simulate what a lower acuity observer would have seen. The synthesised annual means of RB are then re-scaled to the full observed RGO group number RA using a variety of regression techniques. It is found that a very high correlation between RA and RB (rAB > 0.98) does not prevent large errors in the intercalibration (for example sunspot maximum values can be over 30 % too large even for such levels of rAB). In generating the backbone sunspot number (RBB), Svalgaard and Schatten (2015, this issue) force regression fits to pass through the scatter plot origin which generates unreliable fits (the residuals do not form a normal distribution) and causes sunspot cycle amplitudes to be exaggerated in the intercalibrated data. It is demonstrated that the use of Quantile-Quantile (“Q  Q”) plots to test for a normal distribution is a useful indicator of erroneous and misleading regression fits. Ordinary least squares linear fits, not forced to pass through the origin, are sometimes reliable (although the optimum method used is shown to be different when matching peak and average sunspot group numbers). However, other fits are only reliable if non-linear regression is used. From these results it is entirely possible that the inflation of solar cycle amplitudes in the backbone group sunspot number as one goes back in time, relative to related solar-terrestrial parameters, is entirely caused by the use of inappropriate and non-robust regression techniques to calibrate the sunspot data.

The historic landscape of the Mendip Hills

When travelling north-east across the Somerset Levels and Moors the eye is drawn to the dark mass of the Mendip Hills, a Carboniferous Limestone ridge which rises abruptly from the flatness of its surroundings. The Historic Landscape of the Mendip Hills explores the archaeology and architecture of this remarkable corner of England, beginning with evidence for the first hunting groups who passed through the region over half a million years ago. Succeeding generations have left their mark on the Hills, from the enigmatic ceremonial structures of the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age, to the ancient farming landscapes and brooding hillforts of the Later Prehistoric period. Field archaeology, combined with architectural and historical enquiry, has also allowed a complex narrative to be constructed for more recent periods of history. This is a story dominated by adaptation and change, evidenced by the developing architecture of manorial centres and the shadowy remains of earlier structures fossilized within village houses. This volume presents a synthesis of the results of recent fieldwork undertaken by English Heritage and traces this region’s remarkable past, revealing ways in which it has shaped the landscape we see and value today.

Solar Collectors for Historic Homes : Linking consumption to perceptions of space

Reduction of household energy consumption is one of the top issues in contemporary discussions on sustainable consumption. This chapter concerns one way through which consumption of purchased energy for house heating can be reduced; by having a solar thermal system added to one's house. However, the fact that one of the components - the solar collector - usually is situated on the roof or the facade of a building, is a recurrent impediment to such installations. In certain contexts, these attributes may melt into the building, while in others, they may be perceived as problematic. The latter may particularly be the case when the appearance of the building is of major imiportance, as with houses deemed worthy of preservation for coming generations. This chapter draws upon a study carried out in Visby Town, a walled Hanseatic town and a World Heritage site on the island of Gotland, Sweden.

The historic religious buildings of Ribeira Grande: implementation of christian models in the early colonies, 15th till 17th century, on the example of Cape Verde Islands

Rui Carita

The initial formation of teachers in scholastic cartography: a report on a research experience

This paper is derived from the PhD research entitled "The initial training of Geography teacher in school cartography: a reflective analysis", developed by the program of Post-graduation in Geography of UNESP, campus of Rio Claro. The research is in the final phase, focused on data analysis and final writing of thesis. In this context, it may be stated that the research orientates in the problematic focused at the understanding of how the recent knowledge produced by the school cartography unfolds in the practices of Geography licentiate students. However, at this time, we will discuss about issues related to the research by the theoretical and practical point of view.

A historic turning point: political change and the socio-institutional situation in Latin America

Includes bibliography

Pedro Nunes e a distinção de dois tipos de trajetórias na navegação: a linha de rumo e o círculo máximo

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

The mineralogy and chemistry of the German and Portuguese tiles used to face a historic building in the Amazon region and their natural susceptibility to tropical weathering

As proeminentes edificações da cidade de Belém foram revestidas durante o século 19 com azulejos produzidos em Portugal e Alemanha que já apresentam distintos graus de degradação. O Palacete Pinho é uma das mais importantes destas edificações e foi selecionado para se investigar a ação do clima tropical amazônico sobre a degradação destes azulejos. Para atingir estes objetivos mapearam-se os azulejos desta edificação visando identificar as modificações de origem orgânica e inorgânica e coletas de amostras para análises. Os minerais foram determinados por DRX, a composição química por métodos clássicos úmidos e MEV/SED e os micro-organismos por microscopia. Os resultados obtidos mostram que os azulejos Portugueses e Alemães são distintos entre si. Enquanto o biscoito é composto de SiO₂ e Al₂O₃, CaO foi encontrado apenas nos Portugueses. Os baixos conteúdos de Na₂O e K₂O indicam adição de materiais para redução da temperatura de fusão. SiO₂ e PbO compõem o vidrado, já CoO e FeO foram adicionados como pigmentos. O biscoito dos azulejos Alemães é constituído de quartzo, mullita e cristobalita, ao contrário do Português com quartzo, gehlenita, diopsídio, calcita e feldspatos. Os vidrados são amorfos ao DRX. As diferenças químicas e mineralógicas entre os azulejos Portugueses e Alemães indicam que foram produzidos por matéria prima distinta, bem como processo termal. As alterações relacionadas com o intemperismo são as finas camadas de detritos (nos Alemães), manchas de oxidação, manchas escuras, descolamento do azulejo (no Português); perda de vidrado e biscoito tornando-se pulverulento como consequência do estabelecimento de Cyanophyta e bacillariophyta (Português). As distintas feições de degradação dos azulejos refletem as suas diferenças mineralógicas e químicas expostas ao clima tropical Amazônico.

Chemical and mineralogical characterization of portuguese ceramic tiles in the historic center of São Luís do Maranhão (Brazil): an approximation of the mineralogy and firing temperature of the raw materials

Nesse trabalho, foram caracterizados, pela primeira vez, azulejos históricos portugueses do Centro Histórico de São Luís (CHSL) do Maranhão. A caracterização foi realizada através dos ensaios de microscopia ótica, difração de raios X (DRX) e análise química, visando ao uso dessa informação para a determinação das possíveis matérias-primas utilizadas na sua fabricação, bem como a provável temperatura de queima desses materiais. Os resultados mostraram que a microestrutura desses materiais é constituída por poros de tamanhos variados, apresentando incrustações de calcita e grãos de quartzo de tamanhos inferiores a 500 µm, distribuídos numa matriz de cor rosa-amarelo, onde foram identificadas, por DRX, as fases minerais calcita, gelhenita, wollastonita, quartzo e amorfo. A partir da informação obtida, é possível inferir que as matérias-primas originais estiveram constituídas, provavelmente, por mistura de argilas caoliníticas (Al₂O₃•2SiO,₂•2H₂O), ricas em carbonatos de cálcio e quartzo ou misturas de argilas caoliniticas, quartzo e calcita. Essas matérias-primas originais não atingiram a temperatura de cocção de 950ºC.