Construction History as a Part of Assessment of Heritage Buildings

Issues related to the processes of maintenance and ensure the continued serviceability of heritage buildings and civil engineering structures are closely related to the processes of assessment of their technical state, repair and strengthening procedures. One extremely important element for a proper diagnosis of the technical condition of historic buildings and also for the adequate design of the actions associated with prolonging their service life should be to perform architectural and structural historical survey. This analysis must be related to the following aspects of construction history occurring during the design and the construction of such objects: design solutions, methods of structural analysis and dimensioning of structural components, properties of building materials, technologies of their production and also the technology of construction. These studies, supported of course by the use of the full range of modern material examination techniques and computational simulations, allow a more complete understanding of analyzed structures. Furthermore, such a program should also contain a prediction of the development of existing or creation of new damages and degradation of the material, as well as guidelines for repair and renovation works in order to ensure structure's further safe operation. From the point of view of the completeness of such a program and with regards to architecture and structural design, its indispensable elements should be both the historical analysis of the design and the construction of the building, as well as of the entire course of its exploitation.