Understanding Fire Safety of Historical Buildings

Abstract

This paper addresses an issue rarely contemplated in the management of historical buildings, fire safety. Historical buildings are generally assessed within a framework of compliance when it comes to fire safety. There is an implication that “compliant” means “safe” and that the goals and objectives of compliance are perfectly aligned with those of fire safety. In the case of historical buildings this is a mistake that has resulted in the loss of major historical buildings through the centuries. This paper presents a new framework of analysis that uses adequate tools to evaluate and establish true performance assessment so that the goal of fire safety is well defined and implemented.