Cultural environments are the built environment, archaeological heritage and landscape. The Cultural Environment Programme is a common policy for the consideration of cultural environments and their management and use in Helsinki. The City Board has approved it for Helsinki for 2023-2028. It will strengthen the relevance of cultural environments, emphasise the importance of preserving and caring for them, and encourage their use by city residents and visitors. The cultural environment programme drawn up in Helsinki for the first time is the result of extensive cooperation with the city’s various operators and consultation with stakeholders. The starting point is the preservation, development and utilisation of diverse tangible and intangible cultural heritage as a resource in Helsinki. The programme brings together information that explains the development history of the environment and the identity of the region.
In addition to the policies, measures and impacts, the programme report summarises the history and architectural identity of Helsinki’s construction, the development and values of the landscape and green spaces, and the characteristics of maritime Helsinki. The programme discusses the current state of the protection of cultural environments as well as identifies the areas for which protection goals have been defined. Among others, the point of departure in the ongoing large-scale urban rezoning is to update building protection.
Effectiveness through policy guidelines for the programme: a total of 38 measures/actions have been included in the joint preparation for the preservation of cultural environments.
