Study On The Protection And Development Of Industrial Heritage In Railway Cultural Heritage

At present, to protect and exploit industrial heritage has become one of the trends of world culturalheritage research, and the conservation and development of railway cultural heritage functions as animportant object of study in all countries. In China, the railway construction industry started in1980s,developed gradually in the late Qing Dynasty, Democratic Nation period and New China period. That is,although the developing process is filled with twists and turns, it has obtained the result which attractsworldwide attention. With the development of society and economy, these old and shabby railway systemsare faced with the threat of collectively disappearing. However, their precious historical and culturalmeaning, economic, aesthetic and social value make them stand out from all kinds of industrial waste andthen become a kind of cultural heritage. Therefore, people should try their best to find out a way from thepractice to give these valuable things a chance to get rebirth.Internationally, the approaches to felicitously and effectively protect and exploit their national railwaycultural heritages have been taken in such developed countries as Britain, France, America and Japan, andeven the developing countries like India have also had an incredible run of success in protecting railwayheritage. The successful examples about Austrian Semmering Railway, Indian Darjeeling-HimalayanRailway and Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus of Mumbai, and Swiss Rhaetian Railway provide the countriesand areas which are actively exploring in this aspect with important and necessary lessons. There areabundant railway heritages in China, and although people show shallow experience unintentionally in thespecific protecting and developing activities, they are still sparing no efforts to conserve and develop theMiddle East Railway, Yunnan-Vietnam Railway and some other typical railway cultural heritages. As a recently rising type in industrial heritages, railway cultural heritage reveals its inherent valueconstantly and completely in historical, cultural, artistic and scientific aspects with the deepening of theresearch. In the research process, people need to not only refer to and learn from overseas advancedexperience, but also frequently analyze our own approaches and practices, so as to find out a way suitablefor the situation of our country to promote the protection and exploition of railway cultural heritage.