Urban and environmental challenges for a better management of the cultural heritage in four Caribbean cities: Havana, San Juan Viejo, Santo Domingo and Cartagena de Indias

Abstract

The World Heritage Inscription in several Caribbean historic centers meant the driving force for local and even national development. This recognition brought a series of legal protection measures which, however, did not take into account the urban and environmental development of the city and other urban plans developed in parallel. Focusing on four selected case studies in the Caribbean, this article analyzes the challenges that those cities face in the 21st century and also the link between the historic center protection plans and the urban and environmental plans of the global city, which transversally affect the preservation of their cultural properties. For this, through the review of legal-administrative documentation and planning from the legal regime, the article confronts aspects of the management of the four declared colonial cities with the city's overall urban and environmental situation (environmental quality, Climate change, sanitation, communications and transport, urban tourism, etc.) with the aim of proposing joint actions that integrate the Cultural Heritage management in the whole strategy of urban regeneration in a more transversal way. In turn, these joint actions are compared with the general solutions posed by the current Caribbean Action Plan for World Heritage (2015-2019) to improve the heritage management in historical centers. The article concludes with a series of proposals to improve the cultural heritage management of these cities and the preservation of their exceptional universal values.