Including built heritage in environmental improvement and nature recovery: exploring the challenges

Journal article

Significant progress is being made to integrate the UK’s environmental improvement goals, including nature recovery, in the management and conservation of the historic environment. To date, most attention has been given to the over-arching vision and guiding principles, whilst finer scales of practice and delivery are less considered. This includes balancing management decisions and priorities for individual assets with landscape-scale environmental strategy, which may not always align or appear compatible. By reflecting on our experiences working in close partnership with national and local heritage organisations, we highlight three key challenges faced when trying to manage and enhance nature on and around built heritage assets: (1) Conflicts and trade-offs between conservation priorities, (2) uncertainty arising from a lack of knowledge and evidence, and (3) resistance to change. Underpinning these challenges in the UK is the complex diversity of built heritage assets, settings and responsible authorities, which precludes generalised approaches and solutions. In these contexts, we highlight a potential disconnect between ‘top-down’ (landscape-scale) and ‘bottom-up’ (asset-scale) decision-making. We finish with some broad suggestions for navigating these challenges in support of including built assets in the push for connected, culturally rich and biodiverse historic landscapes.

Authors: Coombes, MA; Michette, M; Viles, HA

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Journal: Historic Environment: Policy and Practice
• Publication date: 2026-03-21
• Acceptance date: 2026-03-16
• DOI: 10.1080/17567505.2026.2645533
• EISSN: 1756-7513
• ISSN: 1756-7505
• Language: English
• Keywords: built heritage; natural capital; environmental improvement; historic environment; sustainable conservation; biodeterioration