How Can We Ensure Accessibility of Cultural Heritage? Toward Better Utilization of Existing Assets in Japanese Context.

How can we ensure accessibility of historical buildings that were built before the idea was ever dreamt of? Important historic monuments such as World Heritage have come to be made to some extent accessible with due consideration of their historical value (in extreme case, no accessibility is available, and replicated models or virtual reality is alternatively in place). Many buildings that are currently in use pose problems because they have to be usable by everyone. To what extent the historical values can be sacrificed for accessibility and usability? This paper tries to propose some ideas to meet both needs of historical significance and accessibility/usability through examination of several Japanese examples.