Real-Life Decision Making
The Wayburn Theater was a beautiful brick building in its day, and has
been presiding over the downtown area of Wayburn for a century. However, in
the past several years, the building has been unoccupied and is falling into
disrepair.
The city, spurred on by a local heritage organization, has decided that
it needs to do something to maintain the building. The building is in danger
of disintegrating beyond repair.
However, the city is tight for money and doesn't think that it can completely
refurbish the building to its former glory. The heritage organization held
fund-raisers to pull together a chunk of money, but it simply doesn't have
enough for what is required to entirely restore the building.
The city is fielding a couple proposals from developers on what can be
done about the situation. As an architectural historian, you've been called
for advice on what route the city should take when dealing with the building.
First suggestion: Remove parts of the building too expensive to
repair and substitute some materials with less expensive ones. The building
will be repaired, but won't be entirely authentic to the era in which it was
built.
Second suggestion: Demolish the building that is in such a state
of disrepair. Replace it with a new facility that reflects modern times and
modern architecture.
You would prefer a third suggestion, which would be to preserve the building
to its former glory. But without proper funding, this isn't an option.
What do you do?