Case No. -009- Heavy trucks passing through the sorrounding of Aleppo Citadel

The field team of the Architectural heritage violations observatory has monitored an urgent case of urgent violation in the street surrounding the Aleppo citadel.
This area is considered one of the most significant public spaces with immense historical and touristic value.
The team recorded subsidence in the stone paving layers resulting from the passage of heavy vehicles.

Description of the Violation:
The deterioration has been clearly documented in the stone paving layers of the street surrounding the Citadel, specifically in the area extending from Dar Al Iftaa to the old Immigration and Passports building.
The gravity of this violation is represented in the following:
Physical destruction: the passage of heavy trucks has led to significant subsidence in the paving layers surrounding the Citadel, which caused cracks in the stone tiles, causing the structural integrity of the street surface.
Loss of value: the deterioration of the paved tiles leads to a loss of the street's aesthetic value and distorts the historical landscape of the Citadel’s surrounding.
Visual distortion: the subsidence in the paving layers and the accumulation of water in the resulting depressions have caused clear visual distortion to the Citadel’s surroundings.

Technical assessment:
This infringement upon the site is considered a explicit violation of architectural heritage for the following reasons:

Functional changes: Converting the Citadel’s surrounding into a transit corridor for heavy trucks contradicts the intended touristic and cultural function of the site.
Violation of the Minimum Intervention Principle: The continuous flow of heavy trucks will increase the cost of rehabilitation in the long term, whereas the problem could be resolved in its early stages by enforcing necessary regulations.

Standardized assessment:
Risk level: 7/10 (Relatively high risk).
Treatment Priority: Extreme, due to the continuous deterioration of the street’s condition with every new heavy vehicle passage.

Treatment Recommendations:
The Observatory stresses the necessity of immediate action to prevent further damage through the following measures:
Urgent Traffic Regulation: Issuing an immediate decree banning the passage of trucks and heavy vehicles in the street surrounding the Citadel and rerouting them to alternative axes.
Legal prohibition: Installing traffic signs prohibiting truck passage, with high financial fines imposed on violators to ensure strict compliance.
Restoration: dismantling the stone tiles in the affected subsidence areas and reinforcing the layers before repaving, using treated original stones or replacing broken ones with identical stone types.

The team from the Architectural heritage violations observatory will submit an official letter to the relevant authorities in the Aleppo city council and the traffic directorate to begin solving this problem in order to prevent it from worsening.