3.2 Industrial Heritage Information Acquisition an...
3.2.1 Temporal Evolution of Chinese Modern Industry
Because of limitations in research methods,previous studies have mainly been based on the documents and personal opinions of researchers.In contrast,this research is a comprehensive multi-perspective study,in which geographic information system software(GIS)has been utilized for the assessment and reconfirmation of the historical stages of industrial heritage.[7]With this method,data from nearly 2 200 related industrial factories in modern China have been collected,including specific establishment dates for 2 131 of them.Because of the sharply increasing number of factories since the foundation of the People's Republic of China,and the near-lack of varying opinions about their temporal development,this research focuses on factories built between 1840 and 1949 as the main object of study.
3.2.2 Establishment of a Historical Database
As mentioned above,this research considers industrial factories in modern China established during 1840-1949 as its research objects;these were selected from previous studies that featured relatively complete information and displayed a systematic approach towards careful documentation and data collection,as well as a high number of citations.[8]With regard to the factories and plants possessing specific set-up times and locations,their information was recorded in the GIS database as a point data set,with positional accuracy controls carried out within the range of the county(district)of the factories.The name,set-up time,industry type,and the capital type(such as state-owned enterprises,private enterprises)of each factory were also collected to establish a historical and geographic information database of Chinese modern industry.For railway data,the research team collected polyline data sets including attribute information such as name,establishment date,operation time,and number of construction workers.（Liu Jing,2017）
The base map was adapted from the CHGIS system(V5 version,1911)(Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies,the Institute for Chinese Historical Geography at Fudan University,2012)developed by the Fairbank Center for China Studies,Harvard University and the Center for Historical Geographical Studies of Fudan University.The basic unit for spatial analysis is county-level administrations(excluding Taiwan,China),and where counties lacked an administrative boundary,the municipal administrative boundaries were adopted instead.This research is founded upon the basic assumption that the base data is in itself reliable.The collected information includes many modern factories and mines in modern China as typical examples that can be representative of the distribution characteristics of the research period.The second assumption is that the administrative boundaries were relatively stable over the period of this dataset.
The resulting maps showcasing the relative density of factories demonstrate the temporal-spatial evolution of modern industry in China and mines during different periods.
3.2.3 Establishment of the Current Database(https://www.daowen.com)
Procedural standardization was considered to be an essential precondition for the data collection work.Therefore,an integrated framework was established before developing the database.The following represents the basic procedure for the data collection of industrial heritage facilities:
（1）Establish a standard set of regulations and plans:compile a unified“Census Form of Chinese Industrial Heritages”,and create the necessary regulations and time schedule;
（2）Collection of information on the census area:compile data from the Third National Archaeological Survey of relevant areas,as well as local documentation of modern industrial facilities,CAD drawings,aerial photos,and site plans;
（3）Implementation of the field survey:based on the information collected from archival sources it became possible for both professionals and volunteers to conduct the field survey with the cooperation of related governmental departments.
Concerning the status of Chinese industrial heritage research conducted up until 2018,we can account for 1 536 industrial heritage sites in total,which include 1 443 modern industrial heritage sites and 265 sites of reconstruction and reutilization.The database contains information on each site,including names,establishment times,locations,addresses,degree of protection,type of functional transformation,and positional coordinates.The number of industrial heritage sites in various Chinese cities.The top five cities with the largest number of industrial heritage sites are the Shanghai municipality,Guangdong Province,Jiangsu Province,Liaoning Province,and the Tianjin municipality.
During the process of creating the database,three database levels were implemented.First,there is the national level database,which is hoped to become an important reference in the future as the first national survey of its kind.Second,the database at the city level focuses on different industries and their distributions,as well as the usage condition of key industrial cities in which Tianjin municipality is regarded as a case study.The third level is that of State Key Cultural Relics Protection Units.This research can be considered a reference for formulating conservation plans for cultural relics to further strengthen their management.This research takes the North Navy's Taku Dockyard of Tianjin as an example.The third level includes information on multiple aspects of the facilities,from their historical status up to their current status,as well as architectural and environmental information.The concept of temporal data has also been adopted to allow for queries with time variables.(Zhang Jiahao,Xu Subin and Aoki Nobuo,2016)
Moreover,the BIM model has been adopted in the database for recording information about the facilities'architecture and equipment,which,when connected to the GIS database,can provide abundant and precise information.(Du Xin,2013;Shi Yue,2014)