Towards a Sustainable Conservation of Water Heritage: Understanding the Architectural and Cultural Qualities of Bursa's Traditional House‐to‐House Water Transport System

Abstract

The conservation of water heritage has become a critical topic in recent years for the future of sustainable development. In international sources, declarations have been published by UNESCO and ICOMOS on the conservation of water heritage at the monument scale, and urban and landscape layers, water supply, storage, and transport have thus been protected; however, there is no equivalent for civil water architecture at the residential scale. During the research conducted within the scope of this study, traces of a water‐sharing culture were revealed in residences in Bursa, Türkiye. Within this framework, this study aims to identify the House‐to‐House Water Transport System and the historical distribution of Pınarbaşı spring water in the Hisar District of Bursa and to present a restitution proposal alongside a reliability analysis. Therefore, this paper aims to analyse the water technologies of traditional residences and to comprehensively evaluate the water heritage, including its tangible and intangible aspects. Based on a literature review, archive review, oral interviews and field investigations, novel information was ascertained regarding the use of water heritage on a residential scale. As a result of the study, the distribution of the Pınarbaşı water in the Hisar Neighbourhood of Bursa was determined, and its relationship with traditional residences was analysed.