EDITORIAL _ Vol-12, Issue-2 _ 2008
Abstract
Protibesh, the research journal of the Department of Architecture of BUET, accepts the papers focusing Architecture and allied disciplines and presenting ongoing research work in home and abroad. The Editorial board tries to transmit the invitation for papers to a wide range of researchers and professionals. Now a days Protibesh is being recognized by the young researchers as a prosperous outlet to dissipate their own contributions. From the board of the Editors we have tied a big group of scholars and academicians with us as reviewers. The quality of the papers reflects their great contributions to Protibesh. This has established a trend of scholarly writing from the platform of Protibesh and we are thankful to our authors as well as to the reviewers. Moreover, the members of the Board and the other members of the Publication Committee are taking the stress to maintain the quality and timing of this publication in spite of many limitations. We are grateful to BUET authority for their continuous support to this great venture.
This issue of Protibesh consists of six papers. Among these two papers focus on Conservation issues, one on Environmental research, one on Housing and other two on Planning aspects. The first paper tilted “Preventive Maintenance Strategy of Bara Katra, by Mohammad Sazzad Hossain, discusses on some steps of architectural conservation necessary for a historical old structure of Dhaka. The paper mainly focuses on a maintenance plan aiming the sustainable existence of this dilapidated structure. The paper describes the social, historical as well as physical aspects of the outstanding structures of Bara Katra. After a thorough first hand observation of the existing buildings, author tries to asses the required strategy for the conservation of the project in the light of local environmental, socio-political and economic perspective. Finally it takes the challenge to set a specific strategy for preventive maintenance of Bara Katra. Although the suggestions are more or less common in nature, the wealth of this paper is its systematic approach for conservation study. It also took a practical way which is very much regional in type and practical in style. The originality of this paper, particularly, is the study and analytic part, which is worthy for any sort of real attempt for conservation of this historic structure in Dhaka.
The second paper titled “Observations on Performance of Commonly Used Shading Devices in Tall Office Buildings of Dhaka”, by Anisur Rahman and Dr. Khandakar Shabbir Ahmed, explains a simulated study on the shading devices which are popularly used in the climatic context of Dhaka. The paper is a part of M.Arch research and has a great value for its originality. It has initially characterised the type of shading required for the tropical climate of Dhaka, next it has described the popular solutions available in reality. Finally it made a performance evaluation of six types of typical solutions with computer aided simulation programme: ECOTECT. The results show that depth and spacing of overhangs as well as depth, spacing and angle of vertical fins have significant effect on shading performance. Authors suggest that the modification of these parameters may make the shading devices effective in different orientations at the desired periods.
The third paper published here is titled as “Community Participation in Urban Heritage Conservation” by Dr. Mahbubur Rahman and Debashish Nayak. The paper extends discussion on conservation theory as well as the practices. However, the focus is on Community Participation as the conservation strategy, which as development tool is relatively recent and it is increasingly gaining grounds. The paper actually takes the opportunity to report the experiences gathered in Ahmedabad, India. It also cited some experiences in Dhaka. The reviewers took it as an interesting topic much like a case study on an experience. It has finally come up with certain strategies through active participation of the stakeholders. Different levels of participation were also discussed in due course. Among those ‘Heritage walk’ is the most important one which could be a routine work to ensure conservation of historic cities with direct participation of the community themselves.
The fourth paper in the list is “Living beyond the Bound: A Human Rights Perspective towards Habitat of a Refugee Camp” by Yasmin Ara. The author took the advantage to elaborate her first hand observations in the light of existing guideline of human rights. The style followed here is somewhat informal. Although similar descriptions have already found in the presently published writings, this paper seems unique in its idea which took a definite viewpoint here to asses the living condition of the refugees in Dhaka. It has in depth observation of the physical as well as social aspects of living in the Geneva camp. However, the issue discussed here has attained certain rigor with the analysis of the present situation in relation to different treaties and covenants of human rights and housing rights. It is felt that time has come to take necessary steps to strengthen the destitute community living in Dhaka where humanity is being stressed out.Protibesh tried to welcome the planning issues as architecture and planning are interrelated. The last two papers focus on planning strategy for ‘School Safety’ and ‘Sustainability of Development’. In this series the fifth paper is titled as “Planning for School Safety: A Case Study of Earthquake affected Bagh Town in Azad Jammun and Kashmir, Pakistan” by Prof. Dr. S. Shabih-ul-Hassan Zaidi. Recurrent issues like earthquake has now recognised as a part of planning cities and rural areas. This paper is unique in its observation as the author took the opportunity to describe his sole experiences after the earthquake in Pakistan in 2005. The severity of earthquake is illustrated here. The richness lies in the description with statistics as well as in writing. The author tried to summerize the strategies required to tackle the situations like Jammun and Kashmir. This year Pakistan again experienced major earthquake. This paper seems relevant to the planning prospects in this region. The last paper is titled as “Sustainability of Development Trends in the Urban Fringe: A Case Study on North-Eastern Dhaka City” by Md. Shakil Bin Kashem and Dr. Roxana Hafiz. This paper focuses on a mechanism to appraise sustainability using Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) at the local scale of a city. Environmental, social and economical sustainability has been taken as Primary Tier Criteria of MCA. It was revealed through the study that the city is in a negative state of sustainability due to the high negative state of its environmental sustainability situation. Unplanned urban expansion promoted by wide scale of land filling and deforestation is causing the major damages to its environment. Through analysis of the results, this study proposed some actions that can promote sustainability in the whole study area. The study addressed the issue of sustainable development or sustainability is generating wider interest among the scholars and policy makers of both developed and developing countries. This issue of Protibesh also published reports on two Events that took place in BUET organized by the Department of Architecture. First it describes Berger Awards Programme for Students of Architecture, BUET. Here the programme introduced by Berger, a leading paint company, is briefly described. It also includes the high lights of the award cycle 2006-2007, which was the first year of this programme. It mentioned the award winning projects and the key persons who led the programme in general. Secondly, Protibesh focuses on the KU Leuven - BUET Academic Exchange Programme, held in the Department of Architecture, BUET on 18- 21 February 2008. 25 students of Masters Course from Katholieke Universetiet Leuven, Belgium and Wageningen University, Netherlands came to BUET as part of their academic programme. The Department of Architecture held a three day student - teacher interaction programme focused on Urban Design. This programme had different parts which are briefly described in this issue through the synopsis of the papers presented on the occasion. The pictures also show the events that took place. The department of Architecture always tries to hold such a level of academic events which ultimately boost up the academic
environment as a whole.
